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At the end of the road

28th October 2010
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Fish has provided the Scottish haulier with a good business for 90 years, but more diverse customers are the key to its future prosperity

Words: uavid Harris/ Images: Andy Forman

YOU DON'T GET much closer to the northern tip of Scotland than Scrabster, the small port on Thurso Bay where the long-established haulier D Steven & Son has its main base.

The firm is now run by the third generation of the family, in the person of MD David Steven, the grandson of the founder. D Steven & Son has been a fixture in the far north of Scotland since 1920 when it was first set up in Wick.

David, 53, started working at the Wick depot nearly 40 years ago when he was 15 and the firm had just 10 vehicles. Since then it has more than trebled in size, although David says the work is much the same as it always was — we just do a bit more of it".

But even when he started it was a far cry from the horse and cart his grandfa

ther began with, mainly carrying fish from trawlers to curing factories, supplemented by shifting coal around the port.

David admits he wishes he knew more about the early days of the company, but adds with some disappointment that his father died before begot round to asking him for a detailed history.

He adds ruefully:"It was only after he was gone that I realised I should have asked more questions."

But even if the early history of the company is starting to fade from living memory, it seems that the essential nature of the work D Steven & Son carries out has not really changed.

The horse and cart may have gone, but the firm's trucks still carry fish from trawlers to curing factories The difference is that the factories are not on the edge of the port or even necessarily in Scotland: plants in Brittany and Boulogne are regular runs. The French are among the biggest buyers of high quality Scottish fish and shellfish and D Steven is one of the hauliers that takes it to them, as well as to buyers further afield, such as in Spain. It also runs daily services to the fish markets at Hull and Grimsby alongside more general cargo services to the rest of Scotland and all over Europe.

One typical job for the company is the regular contract it has to unload a cargo vessel that calls every Saturday night from the Faroe Islands, discharging large quantities of fish, the sort of work it has carried out in one way or another, for 90 years.

Agriculture also continues to play a big role and cattle feed is another regular load for the firm's 35 vehicles and nearly 60 trailers.

Perfect platform

In 1996 the firm constructed a purposebuilt cold storage depot in Scrabster, a development that provided the perfect platform to continue its expertise in transporting fish and shellfish.

The firm now has 60 staff but is still in family hands with David's brother Christopher, 42 also a director.

Oil is another big industry in the north of Scotland served by the company. but mainly in terms of carrying supplies for the oil workers rather than heavy equipment. Newer business includes supplying workers on the wave energy projects now springing up off the Scottish coast. Scrabster is well sited on the shores of the Pentland Firth, which separates the Orkney Isles from the northern Caithness coast and is widely recognised as a leading global hub for the development of wind, tidal

and wave energy technology The diversity of its work has been important for D Steven in surviving the recession, says David, although he admits the downturn has affected the firm. This is particularly so in the fishing business, which has been under pressure for years, with quotas reduced year by year as the authorities wrestle with the problem of keeping enough fish in the sea while dividing up the total catch fairly.

The pressure on construction companies has also hit D Steven in the past three years.

He says: "Like everybody we were affected by the slow-down in building work. We used to carry quite a lot of loads of bricks and cement but that has really dwindled and there is no sign of recovery."

But the work taken on by D Steven now includes handling deliveries to several big-name supermarkets with branches in Caithness, which has provided yet another important facet to the wide-range of haulage it undertakes.

So the company has been resilient in the face of the difficulties the recession has thrown up, and it has hung to its depots in Aberdeen and Glasgow as well as Serabster and Wick.

Big effort

Its staff have stayed loyal and David puts this down to the big effort the firm makes to treat them properly One mechanic has been with them for 40 years and several drivers more than 30. "We do try to look after them," he says.

Unsurprisingly, there is great pride in the firm after such a long history. Its trucks have a striking red and white liv cry which, as David points out, uses the same script as its first vehicles did in the 1920s. David describes this as an "old, traditional one, not block capitals", which is in keeping with the old-fashioned values of this family firm. But there is nothing old-fashioned about the vehicles, with a modern fleet of big-engined Scanias, Volvos and Mercedes-Benz. The combination of a weff-kept fleet and striking livery makes these vehicles a favourite for truck-spotters all over the UK.

So what next for D Steven & Son? David Steven has many of the same concerns as hauliers up and down the UK, notably fuel duty, which, if anything, is even tougher for hauliers on. the fringes of the country.

He says: "We have a long way to go before you get anywhere at all and the hills mean we are harder on fuel and on the trucks than most operators. It's difficult terrain here. Of course, we could do with some help on fuel duty — but I don't think we'll get it." •

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