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Pallets-R-us!
Page 24
Page 25
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Hilary Devey started Pall-Ex seven years ago from a portable
building. Jennifer Ball talks to her about how the company has
changed, and life at a new high-tech hub in the East Midlands.
Hilary Devey fell into haulage by default rather than choice; she worked at a local transport firm to earn some pocket money during her school holidays. "My father said to me that he could no longer afford to keep my horse so I better get up and do something about it," she recalls. "I went to help out at a local hauliers but had no idea that 20 years later I would be running my own pallet network."
Between leaving school and going to college she worked at a local firm monitoring tachograph charts — tachograph legislation had just been introduced:Not many people know that I started in haulage monitoring tachos... I don't usually go back that far," she laughs.
Devey is well known in the industry under the surname Sharpies: the change of name dates from her marriage in June.
Wealth of experience
After college she moved into personnel at Littlewood's distribution centre before stints at Tibbett & Britten and Scorpio, which was part of the United Carrier Network. She then spent seven years in TNTs retail distribution department before setting up her own consultancy.
Devey's company, Bespoke, ran a network using hanging garments but this was unsuccessful because of the costs and volatility of the market. so she looked at the pallet sector.
The original Pall-Ex was a far cry from the I5.000m' hub in Ellistown, Leicestershire and the luxurious office suite that she enjoys today. The firm began life in a disused airfield; the offices were an old corrugated iron hangar and a hut with no water or electricity.
Devey drove thousands of miles researching the market and aggressively marketing the Pall-Ex brand: "I carried a dic-taphone in the car and if I saw a company name on the side of a trailer I would take it down and when I got back home I'd write to them. I knew a pallet network was a good idea but it was trying to convince other hauliers that was the hard part. I must have been bloody good at it." she says. She was clearly determined to succeed. On Pall-Ex's first night of operation the network had just 29 members and handled 117 pallets.Today it has 88 members and handles 6.500 pallets a night.
Devey is known as a glamorous woman in a male dominated industry and finds that life as a woman in transport has its pros and cons: "In the beginning many of the hauliers showed a macho protectiveness towards me. They were aware of how hard I was working running the business and sorting their problems out.
"I had to do it better than a man and had to succeed as there were so many people waiting to see me fall— but! didn't think for one minute that I would fail. I also had a problem with getting the banks to back me, but now they're bending over backwards to give me money. As time as gone by I don't think my gender has been an issue."When Pall-Ex began there were only two other players in the pallet market: Palletways and Palletline. Devey looked closely at their structure and tried to learn from some of the problems that they had encountered.
So what sets Pall-Ex apart from its rivals? Devey believes it's the company's bespoke IT system, which it developed in-house: "It was the best but most frightening decision I made.
"I spent hours with external IT companies showing trie what they could do, but I quickly realised that they couldn't write a system if they were unaware of what I was trying to achieve. So we wrote it all ourselves, which enables us to adapt the system as we need to.The system is generic so we're compatible with Europe."
Select club
Pall-Ex has strict entry conditions for its members. As well as looking at a company's trading history employees, resources and speaking to its customers, it requires potential members to pay a joining fee. "This ensures that potential members are fully committed to becoming a member of the network,and that they are sure it is the right direction for their company," Devey explains."If one firm fails to make a delivery for another member of the network it will do the same,and it becomes self-perpetuating.
"To make the network work we need compatibility and quality throughout. All members have t o be singing from the same hymnbook. The money is invested back into the business, as seen in the opening of our new premises" Devey has a close relationship with her members and meets them regularly: "If I am doing something wrong I want our members to tell me so that! can put it right. I might not like it, but! have to deal with it.
The potential problems caused by the Working Time Directive are a good example of that relationship. Devey reckons the diversity of Pall-Ex's membership means that while some of them have the resources to deal with its impact, for others it will be March 2005 before they think about its implications "We deem it our responsibility to protect our members from its impact," she says. "We have held a number of workshops for members and other operators, educating them about pooling drivers, resources and getting freight to the hub.
Future prospects -We will benefit from the WTD because there are still large hauliers running groupage and the WTD will significantly impact their ability to do this. It will be totally unacceptable to say to a customer we can't do the work' so they will put more freight through pallet networks.
"Our investment in new facilities is in part helping to prepare for the directive, but we may also be forced to look at regional hubs."
While the company is not directly affected by rising fuel prices and maintenance costs, its members are. As a result Pall-Ex has launched a 'hub procurement system', offering members economies of scale when buying fuel, tyres. trailers and office equipment.
So what does Devey get up to when she is not in the office? As a self-confessed workaholic she admits that even when she gets home she has pallets on her mind:"! don't really have time to do anything else. Saturday I do the shopping and catch up with the things that I haven't done during the week. but I draw the line at ironing I hate it," she laughs. "Sunday all I do is sleep." •