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into Europe There is a small but growing band of hauliers that have clocked up 100 years of running a successful business. But there is surely only one centenarian haulier that can boast of running an equally successful dance band.
In 1947 Reg Bassett coached the RG Bassett Orchestra to the Melody Maker dance band championship, an achievement that was followed by many years of performing to audiences around Staffordshire,
It's been a while since the haulier's band was on the road, but the Bassett name continues to tour the UK and Europe. These days, it's emblazoned on the side of the trucks and coaches that perform its daily vehicle operations.
Bassett Group Holdings is run by brothers Len and Ashley Bassett, who are joint managing directors. Len is a trained accountant, and Ashley is a time-served vehicle engineer with a Foden background.
Bundled together
Since becoming directors and following a restructure of the business in 1989, the brothers have bundled together the general haulage business of RG Bassett & Sons, the local bus to international holiday and travel service operation of Bassett Coachways, the North Staffs Warehousing activity and Bassett Transport Training They now hold the reins of a £36m company, which they say is the product of 100 years of developing and adapting the business—a story of continued prosperity rather than survival against the odds.
"We have progressively met the needs of our transport customers," says Len Bassett. "We don't do things just because that's the way we've always done them. We constantly review our operations in the light of presentday circumstances," cc The company's response to change is immediately evident from the recently published(but not over expensive, given its aim of
1 raising funds for local charities) Basset's of o 1Titlensor, 100 Years of Transport.
The book documents the rise of a family ... enterprise that has survived nationalisation, been bold enough to make several acquisi tions over the years, and has successfully E combined a truck and bus business. While the book relives Bassett's history, the certificates on the company's walls are evidence of its ability to adapt to modern requirements—it is BS5750 and IS09002 registered for all of its activities.
Local operator Beresford Transport became Bassett Group Holdings' latest acquisition last year—which gave the haulage operation its first European business. This provided a challenging new enterprise and involved a steep learning curve: "It became immediately obvious that having taken it over, any other way into European traffic would have been very difficult for us," says Ashley.
Beresford was an established operator with a wide and international subcontractor base. The subcontractors came with the business, but Ashley says this aspect significantly increased the volume of traffic.
RG Bassett vehicles now make regular excursions to France, Italy and Germany, although Ashley says there are no runs he would describe as regular, and few come with backloads organised at the other end.
Consequently, the outward trips have to be timed to meet the customer's needs and to match the availability of return loads sourced from freight agents.
"I think it's fair to say that they backload when they are ready in Italy and that usually means very little is backloaded until Thursday or Friday," says Ashley.
Flexibility is therefore the key to the Bassett's operation. Although its European activity has its own designated drivers, there are other drivers who can be called upon to support it. In fact, the ability to support other parts of the business seems to come with a driver's job.
"We've drivers with licences to drive our trucks, coaches and fork lift trucks," says Len.
"This flexibility even extends to the workshop staff," adds Ashley. Some of them have the same capabilities to help us out if need be. That's one reason why we don't have to use agency drivers on the job."
He says this is a good thing because cus
tomers prefer to see drivers they know who are familiar with the job. Jobs for UK-based RG Bassett drivers could involve a 2am departure to Gloucestershire with a load of newsprint for a timed delivery at 4am, or dropping steelwork down in Somerset.
Such jobs are completed efficiently thanks to the flexibility of the workforce—an undoubted advantage on the Group's 11-acre site. It already has three warehouses and will add a fourth early next year.
"We've just got the planning permission— now we are saving up to build it," says Ashley. That shouldn't be such a daunting task— work is already available to fill the warehouse.
"We are pretty confident that through our existing client base, there is sufficient business to make it worthwhile," says Len. "But it is important that whatever extra we take adds value to our existing business. We would not be too keen to let the warehousing space alone. We want the distribution business as well," Bassett's existing warehouses contain a wide variety of products and up to 10 of the company's vehicles are likely to be loaded from them each day. Some will load with steel, some with non-ferrous metals, others with china earthenware—as you might expect from a haulage company based in the Potteries.
But this is a far cry from the goods carried in the company's early days. "The traffic in the 1900s was used for constructing the local infrastructure," says Len. "The company was using horses, carts and steam engines. The stone was loaded and unloaded by shovel. We do very little road stone now, but we do have a couple of tippers, which carry bulk china clay."
If the goods carried and destinations visited have changed radically for Bassett in 100 years of trading, one thing has not. The business is still relatively free of fixed contracts. The bigger fleets have secured fixed distribution contracts, but Len says that these are not so frequent for general hauliers such as Bassett. In the true spirit of the general haulier, Ashley adds: "We get tomorrow's work today, sometimes at 6.30pm and sometimes much later."
Operating practices It is operating practices such as this that make the general haulage business so exciting and both brothers extol the virtues of the professional general haulage driver and the general haulage specialist—roles they feel are sadly underplayed.
"Looking at things from a driver's point of view, it takes a little bit more to drive for a general haulier than it does to do the same run with the same load every day," says Ashley. "Every day brings another set of experiences for the driver and the operator," adds Len. "That, in our opinion, should be more highly valued by the industry."
Indeed it should. Perhaps there ought to be some kind of award for the best general haulage operation. Your views on the subject are welcome.
by Steve McQueen