Welch’s Transport celebrates its 90th anniversary this year and it has used the milestone to announce a new MD – Jim Welch’s son Chris.
Chris has worked within the company for 10 years and he will become the fourth generation of the Welch family to take up the reins.
Current MD Jim will move across to focus on the Group business.
In addition, the East Anglian firm said David Welch, Chris’ brother, will become group operations manager after joining the firm in 2021.
Gordon Welch founded the logistics business with one vehicle in 1934 in Foxton, near Cambridge and he passed it to his son Roger, who retired in 2000, and Jim has been at the helm since then.
Today, Welch’s Transport operates 85 HGVs, as well as cranes and support vehicles, across three depots.
Chris said one of his first priorities as MD would be to consolidate the range of services it currently offered, which included warehousing, efulfilment, contract logistics, specialist movements, crane hire and HGV repairs, as well as transport services, and make them easier for customers to access:
“It’s time to make sure our customers know exactly what services we have available to support them with their logistics needs,” he said.
“And that means communicating clearly at every opportunity. I see a huge part of my role being to join up the dots so that everyone understands what Welch’s do and how we can help, from contract logistics to net zero solutions.”
Welch’s Transport has made great strides in carbon reduction activities and it is one of only a few SMEs invited to take part in a government programme demonstrating the potential for battery-electric trucks.
It has also invested in one of the UK’s first publicly accessible HGV superchargers, as well as taken delivery of a Renault Trucks E-Tech D Wide 4x2 curtainsided rigid, with two 40-tonne units on order.
Chris added: “Welch’s Transport has always made a special effort to look after our customers, our staff, and the people in the community around us.
“Our mission is very simple: ‘Let’s make this part of the world as good as it can be,’ and that statement drives everything we do.”
