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SHOP TALK
Page 125
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First, a welcome to those who are aking part in our Workshop Conference Telford and to those visiting our exibition and watching demonstrations. or the many who can't come along this ear, take a look at our synopses of apers and stand-by-stand pages — hese are companies committed to the oad transport parts and service indus rY.
We're nearly in the "shake-up Nineour own term. We must cope vith the increasing demands for quality, 'ocherous claims that shortages of skiled, even apprenticeship, labour will ;row worse, the single European market .nd all those aggravations that cannot be precast.
In the face of this, and current pracical problems, do readers have priorities hey would like to see covered by Work'hop? We are quizzing Workshop Confermce delegates and welcome letters.
For some readers, words of comfort rom Motaquip sales manger Len Grey. ['hey won't help workshops faced with he problem of servicing an added num)er of trucks over the weekend, but nay calm some businesses.
The radical changes in the UK parts market, says Grey, may have a henefi:ial effect on independent factors, since he recent spate of buy-outs will probibly reduce the number of national fac:ors in each area.
To quote Grey: "The independent fac-.fzir now has more of an opportunity after Deing threatened by the fast-fits and lational chains for a numbr of years." Motoquip already has 220 independent factor accounts and is seeking to in:Tease that number.
The Factoring Services Group now produces a journal, Trade, to provide an might into methods of increasing business efficiency and stimulating growth. It strongly advocates every family operated business to form a board: no family not involved in running the business, no faithful non-director employees or professional advisers, but about nine people who run their own businesses. Pay them around £1,000 to £2,000 a year.
Among bigger fish, we note that Continental of West Germany, the world's fourth largest tyre manufacturer, has bought a 10% stake in Kwik-Fit Hold ings, in a move to gain a large slice of the British distribution market. And Michelin (Y.: France outbid Japan's Bridgestone by paying £140 million for BIR's National Tyre Services.
NTR director Richard Fdy reckons there are more than 4,000 tyre distribu tors throughout the UK, of which more than 1,600 are controlled by the tyre companies.
The National Tyre Distributors Association is worried about the standard of
repairs to car tyres. Suggests NTDA president Ivan Smith: Tyre distributors should knife any tyre deemed to be unfit for repair.