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by Martin Watkins WHEN West Ham Football Club offered Laceys of East Ham a contract to provide an executive coach for the team, managing director Bill Lacey set about planning other activities for the coach.
Apart from the usual private business parties he thought that it would also be possible to use the coach for English and Continental tours in summer. This is at present an untried market, but Bill Lacey has high hopes for its success.
Asa quicker and cheaper way of getting an executive than ordering one straight from the bodybuilders, Laceys decided to have one of their existing 12-metre Volvo coaches converted. This way they had the use of the 53-seater coach through the summer peak season and had it converted ready for the start of the football season. I went to visit Laceys just after the conversion work was finished and before the coach's first trip to Ipswich with West Ham reserves.
West Ham need only 25 seats but are grateful for the additional room given by the 12m Volvo, The team usually leave London at mid-day on Friday for long journeys and return after the match on Saturday. Meals are usually taken in Post House hotels, which also can supply packed meals for the return journey.
The actual conversion work was carried out by a subsidiary of Harwood Catering. The original seats were reused and four tables and a bar and L-shaped seat installed in the rear. The coach now seats 36 plus five on the L-shaped rear seat and has been certified to carry 41 passengers.
Laceys are the only company in East London to operate an executive coach and are trying to cash in on this advantage to get private hire work, "We're going to circulate all the shipping and other companies round here," Bill Lacey told me. "We already do a lot of work for P and 0 Lines and should be able to expand on this.'' Where Laceys think their new coach can really score is continued on page 50 the advantage it gives them over British Rail. With the motorway network we can really compete with the railways," said Mr Lacey. "We can give people a meal and drinks on the move and thus save them time. Time is a very valuable commodity these days."
Mr Lacey is a great believer in getting his sums right before he commits himself to a new business venture. -With a coach costing around £30,000 with only 41 seats the hire rates will have to be about 25 per cent up to make it pay," he said. The actual conversion of the coach to executive costs Laceys around £2,000.
Using executive coaches for touring is something new, but Lacey have high hopes for its success. "We will have to push the fares up, but I'm sure people will appreciate the extra facilities," he said. -The Volvo chassis is easier to service in Europe and this is also a big advantage for tours work." For the last season Laceys increased their fares by 15 per cent on tours and 20 per cent on express services — although -the Traffic Commissioners gave them permission to put fares up by 33 per cent. This brought in more money, but resulted in an overall drop in the numbers of passengers carried.
-People have had coach travel too cheap for too long,said Mr Lacey. He thought that programmes were bound to become more restricted in future with less variety on offer to the public.
Despite the good weather this summer Laceys were disappointed at the level of business. -It should have been a really bumper year — we got rid of 25,000 of our brochures — but the business never really came in."
Now they have high hopes of the new executive and hope to get another direct from the bodybuilders before too long. "We got a good kick off with the contract from West Ham. Now its up to us to make it work," summed up Mr Lacey.