Aspray 24 trebles pre-tax Recession efficiencies profit despite turnover drop must be maintained
Page 11
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
ASPRAY 24 ALMOST trebled pre-tax profit last year to £901,230, despite a 9.5% fall in turnover.
The Willenhall, West Midlands-based company, which changed its trading name from Aspray Transport in May, posted a pre-tax profit of £901,230 for the year ended 31 December 2009, compared with £301,814 in 2008.
Revenue, however, slipped 9.5% to £20.9m from 1.23m, which the firm attributes to the majority of customers handling less cargo.
"Three main factors led to the pre-tax profit growing even though volumes dropped," says Stuart Laight, Aspray 24 MD.
He tells CM that during the period all employees took a salary cut and agreed to a change in shift patterns: "Essentially working longer and harder.
A number of redundancies were also made, with staff headcount reduced by 14% to 441.
"Finalk we saw a lot of our fuel costs reduced.We became much more stringent in diesel use and invested in driver training to ensure we utilised our trucks to the full, and 'that we are] not doing unnecessary miles," Laiat adds.
Since the start of the year. the business has started to see a rise in volumes, launched a freight forwarding division (CM 27 May), and re-instated wages to what they were prior to the cut.