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Wincanton plans to fly
Page 16
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• Wincanton Group, the dealerships-to-distribution services group within Unigate, aims to expand hard in Europe. As well as setting up a new European base in Amsterdam from which to build a trade in flower and vegetable transport, it plans to "do a TNT", in the words of managing director David Yeomans, by possibly going into air freight.
Wincanton has just had a highly successful year with turnover (excluding trade within the group) up by nearly 17% to £380 million, and profits up by over 19% to £19 million.
On top of continued growth in its existing markets like vehicle rental, contract hire, distribution and vehicle sales in Britain, it now wants to move into Europe. According to Yeomans, Wincanton is "looking at businesses to acquire on the Continent", even if they are not compatible with existing Wincanton operations. The first area in which it is making a big push is chilled distribution, where it would like to control everything from point of production to point of sale. An example is its Transflora flowers and pot plants business, where Yeomans says the strategy is "to knock out the wholesaler" by going direct from grower to high street. Yeomans believes the flower market alone in Britain is due to grow fourfold in the next four years as British housewives catch up with their Continental counterparts.
From roots such as those, Yeomans predicts that Wincanton could move into a TNTstyle European airfreight operation, just for flowers and fresh vegetables. He predicts that Wincanton could be airborne within three years.