An award-winning, personal service
04 March 2016
Quinn Transport specialises in providing a range of transport solutions.
For over four decades, Athlone-based Quinn Transport has been providing its customers with an exceptional level of service.
We travelled to the midlands and met up with company founder / managing director Tony Quinn to discuss the history and current status of this outstanding and intimate operation, which was voted as The Pallet Network s Depot of the Year in December gone by.
On December 8th, 2014, transport manager Mark Quinn graciously accepted The Pallet Network s Depot of the Year award on behalf of Quinn Transport. The Athlone company garnered the award following a vote by all 23 members of TPN, taking into account a variety of performance-related factors such as punctuality, paperwork and administration.
The Pallet Network s MD Seamus McGowan and chairman Owen Cooke were present at the Clyde Court Hotel, Ballsbridge to present the prestigious award to Mark, who has been involved in the family-run business for 16 years. Operating out of Blyry Industrial Estate in Athlone, Quinn Transport prides itself on being a family business providing a personal touch to its many business partners.
It was nice to win the award but you can t ease up, says founder / proprietor Tony Quinn. We work very hard and we d consider ourselves to be sloggers. We have a very strong work ethic here and we have always gone that extra mile to look after our customers. To survive in this business, you have to provide your customers with a better service than anybody else; we are very conscious of this. You can t rest on your laurels or take anything for granted because there s always another load waiting to be delivered.
Quinn Transport was set up by Tony in the early 1970s and – centrally located at the heart of Ireland, just off the M6 (Dublin – Galway motorway) – specialises in providing a range of transport solutions including home deliveries, retail deliveries, Cash on Delivery, pallet distribution, full loads, refrigerated transport and boat transport / abnormal loads. A daily nationwide service is provided as well as delivery / collection from the UK and Europe.
At present, the Quinns operate a mixed fleet of 25 vehicles, including vans, rigids and artics as well as curtainsiders and refrigerated trailers. Full and part loads can be delivered using a range of trailers from 20ft with mounted forklift to 45ft.
The main models in the fleet at present are Iveco, Mercedes-Benz and Renault. All vehicles are fitted with the latest satellite tracking systems and to reduce overheads and downtime – are maintained in-house by Quinn Transport s own team of mechanics.
The fleet is fresh, efficient and fit for purpose. Everything in the fleet is kept in the best possible condition here in our own workshop, Tony notes.
Being a member of The Pallet Network since 2008 links Quinn Transport to 22 other regional haulage companies throughout Ireland and over 80 in the UK. This enables them to organise collection and delivery of palletised freight and cartons / parcels on a 24-hour nationwide basis (48 hours to and from the UK). All companies in The Pallet Network operate to standard procedures set out by TPN and performances are monitored to guarantee a high-quality service. A track and trace system is also offered, with barcodes and individual pallet numbers assigned to all goods so that each pallet can be pinpointed.
The demands placed on transport providers these days are much greater than they were in the past and time is very much of the essence. So organisation and flexibility are key. It s more high-pressure now and nobody is prepared to wait, so you don t keep any stock anymore, Tony notes. If they want a pallet today, they order it today and it goes direct from the factory to the end user.
We re doing a lot of refrigerated work these days chilled, frozen, ambient and the rest is mainly distribution, which Mark oversees and is our main growth area.
We cover Longford, Roscommon and Westmeath for The Pallet Network. As well as next-day nationwide and 48-hour UK deliveries, we can also offer a two-three day service to Europe through the network. Joining TPN has been a good move for us and it was a real honour to be chosen by our fellow members as Depot of the Year.
There s great cooperation between all the members and, as a follow-on from that, we are also starting to cooperate with other people outside the network as well, which is good for everybody as it makes everything more efficient.
Having survived the vagaries of the economic downturn, Quinn Transport is in a healthy position going forward. A strong work ethic combined with a detailed attention to customer care should ensure that this long-established family business continues to thrive.
They have recently added a new warehouse to their operation on foot of a new distribution contract and have also taken over another company.
Looking to the future, Tony is optimistic that a period of sustainable growth could be imminent:
The economy is on the up again and we re looking forward to better days, he concludes. There were turbulent years from 2008 up until 2014 and we had to change direction because a lot of the companies we were dealing with went out of business. We were largely dependent on building, so we had to reinvent the business. But we re in a strong position now and we re going to keep working hard and continue giving each and every one of our customers a personal service. The plan is to expand the distribution end of the business and I can also see us getting more into foodstuffs.
One thing is certain: whatever this award-winning company does, they will do it well as they have done for forty-plus years!
Quinn Transport,
Blyry Industrial Estate,
Athlone,
County Westmeath.
Tel: 090 6478862 Fax: 090 6472499
Email:
Taken from Irish Trucker & Light Commercials magazine, Vol 18 No 5, July 2015
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