Palletline has had a busy time of it of late with the launch of its innovative direct trunking initiative, a new member Purvis Storage and Distribution in Fife, and a bounce in pallet volumes that’s seen it open new regional hubs.
It’s a nice position to be in, the sort of problem most transport companies like to have.
Strong growth – there was a 20% increase in volumes last year and MD Kevin Buchanan told the Hub recently the current growth rate was running even higher – was capped with a record night on 5 December, which saw 14,500 pallets moved within the network in 24 hours.
While long term decisions about the future shape of the network are made, Palletline has opened two overflow regional hubs (taking it to six hubs run both directly and by network members).
New sites include Panic Transport in Rugby operating a South Midlands hub (mainly handling overflow volume from the Palletline central hub at Birmingham’s Starley Way) and CS Ellis providing regional sortation for the East Midlands at one of its locations.
Global Logistics (UK) already runs a regional hub at Trafford Park and a Scottish hub based in Cumbernauld, Lanarkshire operated by ARR Craib was launched in 2012.
The strong performance can be seen in the network’s latest accounts, which run to 30 June 2013.
The network’s membership, now 69 strong, shared a dividend payment of £214,000 between them after a year that saw turnover at the network increase 6.9% to £14.4m. This was thanks to an increase in underlying hub volumes of 11% year-on-year.
Operating profit was 25.6% up at £1.9m (2012: £1.54m) with pre-tax profit 36% ahead of 2012 at £1.7m (£1.2m).
However Buchanan sees plenty more scope for growth. “There’s still more freight moved outside of pallet networks than within,” he said. “The regional hubs allow us to help members better compete against the likes of Partnerlink.”