Cranleigh Freight Services was established in 1977 to provide high quality transport services to Europe, and has become one of South East England’s premier logistics providers. CFS started operating from a single office in Cranleigh, Surrey, with a single leased truck, and has gone from strength to strength, growing into a multi-depot company with a range of modern vehicles, including a fleet of European Adjustable Double Decks. It offers a full range of transport services for customers in various European countries: its domestic services include Nationwide UK pallet distribution, contract warehousing and DHD Direct Home Delivery service. It adds up to a total logistics solution with a breadth of services few companies can match. Becky Young, Cranleigh Freight Services’ Sales & Marketing Manager, spoke to Warehouse & Logistics News.
Warehouse & Logistics News – Who set up Cranleigh Freight Services, and are they still involved?
Colin and Pauline Young set up CFS in 1977, and are still involved in the business: Colin is Chairman and Pauline is the CEO. The joint Managing Directors are Graham Young (Becky’s husband) and David Wells. Colin still takes an active interest in all aspects of the business.
WLN – Where is CFS now based?
We’re still in the Cranleigh area, at Dunsfold Park, just outside the town. We moved to larger premises in 2005 and now operate with 160,000 square feet of warehousing.
WLN – How big is CFS these days, in turnover, vehicles and depots?
Our forecast turnover for 2008 is £17.5m. We have 100 vehicles between our two owned sites, Dunsfold and Hemel Hempstead. The DHD network operates from a further 11 regional depots, and as part of Pall-Ex we have a further 99 other depots at our disposal, ensuring palletised delivery to every postcode, every day.
WLN – Can you tell us about your Direct Home Delivery (DHD) Business 2 Consumer service?
‘DHD’ Direct Home Delivery is a nationwide, two-man, ‘White Glove’ home delivery service for the furniture, upholstery and the bedding market, with the emphasis on quality of service and customer care. We’re doing an average of 2,000 deliveries per week.
WLN – How long have you been members of Pall-Ex? What difference does CFS being members make to your customers?
We were the fifth member of Pall-Ex, which has established itself as the number one network. We’ve enjoyed open dialogue with Pall-Ex’s senior management since the start, and share their vision of our collective goals and service levels.
WLN – How fast is CFS growing?
We’re seeing steady growth: three years ago we turned over £12.5 to £14 million. Our fleet has also expanded steadily, in line with our overall growth, led by home delivery.
WLN – We last spoke to your company at length in April 2005, when I interviewed Joint MDs David Wells and Graham Young. Are they still in the business?
They certainly are! David leads the “home front”, overseeing the DHD home delivery and UK palletised operations, and Graham oversees our European interests and warehousing. Because our operations are so diverse, we need two leaders, but they work together very closely, along with a team of senior managers, to ensure we aren’t overstretched – they excel at keeping all the plates spinning!
WLN – Who’s on the senior management team today? As Sales and Marketing Manager, are you involved with all the clients?
We have five managers, one for each key area – Lissa Gallimore for the UK, Ben Cox in Europe, Mark Fazey for Home Delivery, Tim Munro, Warehousing and overall site manager, and me, Sales & Marketing. I’m involved with our clients from all sectors, from submitting tenders and opening the conversation, to managing accounts and visiting with the sales team. I’m also prepared to stick my head above the parapet when things don’t go to plan.
WLN – What’s changed since 2005 in your business?
The biggest change is in our customer profile, especially in retail. We’ve enhanced our home delivery service, holding aggregate stock and offering order fulfilment, and carrying out two-man home deliveries, so clients can outsource this entire function. Two large high street retailers have opted for tailor-made logistics through us – they wouldn’t have shifted, if it didn’t make good business sense! What hasn’t changed since we were founded is the Cranleigh Freight Services customer-focused approach – we deliver all kinds of different services and remain focused on the customer’s business and requirements, and keep everything we do open and transparent.
WLN – To deliver all this, presumably you’ve invested in technology improvements?
We’ve invested significantly in CAPTAIN, the Cranleigh Automated Process Tracking & Information Network. We built it from scratch for our home delivery needs, to cover WMS, order visibility and routing of vehicles. It’s plugged into our home delivery depots: the next step is to offer client access by Q1 2009, and then visibility to consumers. We also want to install it in stores so they can agree delivery dates instantly. We’re three-quarters of the way to achieving this.
The UK departments’ operational system was upgraded in Jan 2008, and the new streamlined functions offer automated functions including direct upload of orders via CSV file and auto-invoicing via PDF. In conjunction with Pall-Ex, we have invested in hand held PDA equipment providing enhanced delivery information.
Most of our European fleet are satellite-tracked, and all new ones have the Fleetmaster Dashboard in-cab system.
WLN – CFS was set up to provide quality transport services to Europe, so let’s talk about CFS Europe first. How do you sum up your European service proposition?
One third of our business is generated outside the UK, and our European proposition is a service as individual as our clients. We specialise in the automotive, aviation, events and exhibitions sectors: we have Q7 Rollerbed trailers for our aviation customers, to carry airline pallets. All our mega-trailers have tilt and slide roofs enabling crane and side loading: our specialist double-deck equipment comprises two Road-trains and six trailers.
Our core business is the Just In Time market, for events and motor sport: there was a decline in our European business in the last few years due to unregulated foreign competition, but the JIT market’s come back to British hauliers because we eliminate the doubt you get with foreign carriers. We can’t compete with overseas hauliers on bulk prices, but promise full and perfect delivery.
WLN – Which European countries does CFS Europe serve?
The main countries we work in are Belgium, Holland, France, Germany, Italy and Scandinavia. We also go all over Europe for specialist events, and via Pall-Ex we send smaller consignments to 38 countries five days a week.
WLN – How many vehicles do you have in your European fleet? What goods do the European Adjustable Double Decks carry?
We have 48 artics. Our European double-deckers carry non-stackable and fragile items: we can take 76 Euro pallets, versus 66 on a normal double deck. The key is flexibility.
WLN – Who are your major customers?
Our longest standing European customer is Martinair Holland, a cargo airline we’ve worked for since 1982. We also work for several other international airlines. In the UK we work for quite a few retailers, including high street stores, furniture stores, department stores and e-tailers.
WLN – How does your import/export implementation service work? Do you provide these services yourselves or through local partners?
We operate a seamless service with our partners in Europe and through the Pall-Ex network. We offer a single point of contact to service clients’ needs, whether in the UK, Europe or internationally. We don’t discriminate on volume grounds, and welcome all enquiries.
WLN – What’s your typical working time for a full container load to be unloaded? How close do you come to your goal of “every consignment is delivered ‘On time, every time'”?
We can offload a road trailer with 26 pallets within the hour. We measure our success by the level of customer satisfaction. On pallet freight we work to the Pall-Ex service levels: our DHD home delivery service operates at around 98.5% on time.
WLN – As the Sales & Marketing Manager, how do you go about marketing your services?
I have my own sales and marketing department. We put out a lot of fliers, email shots and presentations. Much of our new business is word of mouth in our target sectors: on the sport and events side we also find ourselves increasingly working with global players as partners on major calendar events around Europe.
WLN – How are you set up to service customers?
We have a dedicated call centre for DHD: they also talk direct to our clients’ customer services people in the UK and Europe.
WLN – How much capacity do you have to take on new customers?
We have infinite capacity through the networks we’re part of.
WLN – How has the credit crunch affected your business?
The full effects have yet to be seen, but I think some parts of the media have put the summer’s traditional quiet time in retail and the credit crunch together as two plus two, and come up with five! Our statistics show this year’s summer tail-off is currently no worse than last year. On the UK pallet side, we’ve seen a slight shift to smarter use of freight services, thereby cutting costs, which could simply indicate better business management.
WLN – What do you see as the biggest external factors affecting the way CFS works as a business? How do you deal with these challenges to your profitability?
The worst offender is fuel prices – we can cope with everything else. We are committed to maintaining our service to our clients, so the quality of our work ensures they continue to accept the value in what we do.
WLN – As fuel prices go on rising, what is your approach to passing on fuel price increases to your customers?
On 1 January we revised our rates to all customers inclusive of fuel at January levels, and since then we have worked to a formula in which bulk fuel price rises are applied to each item we transport, announced on the 1st of each month on our web site. By being transparent with our clients, they have accepted what we do.
WLN – How environmentally friendly/’green’ is CFS?
In January 2008 we launched the CFS Environmental sustainability policy, detailing our strategy for reducing our impact on the local and national environment. It includes details of such areas as where we source our consumables, and how we handle our waste. When we approach new clients or apply for large tenders, they often ask about this: to be listed as suppliers by the Olympic Delivery Authority, we had to submit a full breakdown.
WLN – Are you looking at developments like hybrid vehicles and bio-diesel?
We have a company on site at Dunsfold that is a pioneer in bio-ethanol, and we look forward to carrying out a pilot study with them at the appropriate time. We’re looking at adopting electric vehicles and setting up a freight consolidation centre in Dunsfold for the Guildford area, which may become part of future policy on lorry traffic in the city.
WLN – Are you involved in lobbying the Government and other bodies about transport issues? If you could send a message to the Transport Secretary, what would it be?
We support the RHA and FTA and their lobbying: we took part on the last A40 protest, officially supported by the RHA. My message to the Transport Secretary would be, stop shelving the good plans people have come up with for relieving the duty on diesel paid by UK hauliers and for charging foreign hauliers for the use of UK roads, and listen to the transport associations.
WLN – Finally, where do you see CFS going from here?
We will go on looking for expansion opportunities both inside and outside our current business sectors. I’d like to see us reach over £20m turnover in the next two years, based on further development of our home delivery service. This will involve us looking all the time at what else we can do, while continuing to excel in our present business areas.
Cranleigh Freight Services Ltd
Tel: 01483 201330
www.cranleigh.co.uk
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