York looks set to forge ahead
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A FINE recovery for the York Trailer Company was signalled last week when the annual results for 1976 were published in its company report.
Pre-tax earnings of £1,189,000 (£661,000 in 1975) enabled the company to declare a final dividend of 1.182p per share with a tax credit of 35 per cent, payable on July 1, 1977.
Total distribution for the year is 1.919p per share, equal to a gross dividend of 29.52 per cent.
The recently announced acquisition by York Trailer of Scammell Trailers Ltd, for £693,000 cash adds about 25 per cent additional production capacity to the Group. Although Scammell operated at a loss within the Leyland Group during recent years, York Trailer says it has been making small profits since the beginning of this year.
Scammell operations will continue to be independent and the capable managers of Scammell are welcomed to the York management team.
The earlier acquisition of Anthony Carrimore, like that of Scammell, involved no additional financing, but the outlays have naturally reduced York liquidity, though total borrowings are still around 50 per cent of Group net worth.
Reviewing 1976, the report says manufacturing capacity shrunken by the depression has been built up, notably by the re-opening of the Corby plant.
The acquisition of Anthony Carrimore in 1976 put York firmly in the field of truck hydraulic tippers and trailer dumps, with the certainty of substantial growth especially in export markets.
Overseas sales last year approached 50 per cent of total volume. To develop this export business of the four York companies concerned, a separate company, York Trailer International Ltd has been formed under Graham Brant, an executive director of the York Group.
Local assembly and licensing agreements forr'' York container manufaeture in Portugal has been supplemented; a new purpose-built container plant is scheduled for opera-. tion before the end of this year near Seoul, in Korea.
York Trailers Europa BV is to build a new service and central parts depot at Dordrecht to consolidate York's increasing presence in the Benelux market.
Buoyant home and export sales for 1977 look good, and' net pre-tax earnings are expected to be not less than £1.6 million, subject to freedom from industrial unrest or serious problems of materials supply outside York Trailer's control.