Ma battles to :apture smalls traffic
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by John Darker, AMBIM is always a refreshing exrience to see a transport npany fighting back In conions of adversity. National rriers Ltd probably owe its stence to a decision of Mrs rbara Castle, when Minister Transport, to grant a taper. subsidy of up to £60m over Lye-year period. Without this, strict commercial terms, NCL ild not have 'survived.
klthough the subsidy was ised out some two years ago :er less than £43m of public ney had bolstered its finan) the company had become ch less of a liability to its ent, the National Freight ?oration, thanks to the conted efforts of management staff. Had the country's nomy continued on a rising id NCL could have broken )ugh into profitability. The iipany has suffered, in comi with all road transport raters, from the marked line in national output and ensuing distribution.
osting revenues
.t Southampton, recently, I • what one district manager, n Partridge, is doing in an rt to boost revenues. He was the point of introducing a • local Yellow Diamond colion and delivery service riding next-day delivery veen any two points hi the nt district, including the of Wight.
he next-day delivery, which fully documented, applies veen any of the 38 towns Arn on the company's well luced publicity leaflet — a out parcels van model with olent district map on one and a pricing scale on a ag page.
'hat seems quite extraordinis that NCL has chosen to battle on the very ground has hitherto been the pree of the small, independent, • ator. Anyone with a small has been free in recent s to provide specialist, Ils, services between large res of population within a 3n, or from the' provinces to • opolitan centres, If NCL successfully capture worthwhile local traffic flows, thus, hopefully, gaining some new customers for its national services, the surprisingly cheeky venture may pay off.
The local Yellow Diamond services are to be tried out in other parts of the country. The NCL initiative parallels the similar Relay Express scheme recently announced by BRS Parcels Ltd and the schemes, taken 'together, reflect the urgent desire of the state parcels sector to mop up traffic now unprofitably carried by own-account vehicles, As noted previously, some small professional local carriers may also suffer.
I gather that NCL's market research showed that some 40 per cent of smalls traffic moved less than 50 miles from point of origin. There has, I suspect, been no mystery about this large chunk of traffic available for capture for many years, but major national carriers have probably been too obsessed with the costly national trunking and depot structures to bother their heads about accessible traffic on their doorsteps. There is nothing like adversity for sharpening the wits'!
Next-day delivery
Another new service of NCL is from the Solent area to Jersey and Guernsey using British Island Airways Cargo Services from Southampton airport. This service departs each evening from Monday to Thursday with next-day delivery into most parts of the Islands mentioned. Other Islands in the group are also catered for, with a slightly longer delivery time.
If NCL's efforts to boost revenue from local operations seem relatively small beer in the context of the company's massive total problem their efforts to promote the movement of export goods to Europe may be in a higher category. A major breakthrough with exporters of goods in the 50 to 1,000kg band could yield dividends, long term.
After the recent tie-up with the French SERNAM company, whereby smalls consignments can be collected anywhere in the UK and delivered anywhere in France, NCL has prepared price lists—now being issued to customers—for traffic to France, West Germany, Holland, Belgium and Luxembourg. Active steps are being taken to add Italy to the list.
Postal codes
The price lists—and the accompanying coding list—would be easier to use if all countries in the EEC, including Britain and Holland, used identical postal codes. But traffic clerks could soon become experts at providing export managers with dockto-door haulage costs—a major advantage. And exporting firms previously tied to forwarding agents will now have the alternative of using what amounts to a European-wide smalls parcels service, This is an example of road transport giving reality to the politicians' airy statements that Europe is Britain's "backyard."
Southampton gives every indication of being a " live " port and its operations have been as profitable as most of its rivals. I was told, 'however, that cases are not unknown of 8-hour queues while lorries discharge a few tons from a trailer. Localbased hauliers, including NCL, are we'll placed to liaise with Midlands manufacturers needing to discharge goods at Southampton berths.
NCL's use of the LIFT freight terminal in East London has not aways worked with perfect smoothness. I understand that smalls services to Scandinavia may be routed via the Leeds container terminal, since Leeds is well served by road and is also tied in with the Freightliner services.
In company with NCL ,executives—the party included Roy Kneller, an NCL driver Who is convener of shop stewards at Southampton depot—I toured the harbour, by courtesy of British Transport Docks Board. From the sea, the massive facilities in craneage and back-up facilities for container handling, and the new extension to Berth 206 to accommodate the South African container service commencing in 1977/8, are impressive evidence of growth potential.
The massive investment would undoubtedly pay great dividends if the container cranes, currently costing around £800,000, were utilised to their optimum capacity. That, alas, is not possible every day, but Southampton port authorities reckon their land areas, if exploited by new growth industries, would still be worth more than the entire cost of all the costly craneage ! That is perhaps a consolation should containerisation prove merely a brief chapter in the evolutiOn of transport.
Minimal rail
NCL's Southampton depot now makes minimal use of its rail connection. Old wagons in the siding were full of non-urgent disused packing materials, cardboard, and the like. A considerable area of platform beside a disused rail line is to be cleared away to enable large vehicles to circulate in the depot—that is, if funds are available to do this work.
Anyone seeing the old rail platform would wonder why it was not dismantled years ago for this purpose, using depot staff at odd times to undertake a fairly simple, labouring job.
Some independent hauliers I know have greatly improved their premises with little expenditure of money, but using their own staff's ingenuity. God helps those who help themselves !