Europa, splits out Air and Sea into separate operating division

Europa, splits out Air and Sea into separate operating division

Europa Worldwide has split out its Air and Sea business into a separate operating division headed up by Board Director Angus Hind. The new division and significant investment in its air & sea operations, demonstrate the company’s commitment to these parts of the business. The creation of this business unit is intended to increase focus and ensure that they improve the range of air and sea products offered to customers.

Previously, Europa’s sales and customer service teams within its branch network dealt with all operations including air and sea services.  Angus Hind joined the company in November 2013 with a remit to develop its air and sea business, including the expansion of Europa’s Hong Kong operations.

Angus Hind, Director for Air, Sea & Logistics commented “Customers want to know that the person on the end of the phone is a specialist in their field, the old structure did not necessarily provide that. The new structure of having an airfreight customer speaking to an airfreight specialist, a seafreight customer speaking to a seafreight specialist and a road freight specialist talking to a roadfreight specialist will ultimately achieve that.”

The new division will have a team of 30 office staff dedicated to air and sea business.

Angus added “The decision to separate Europa’s air and sea teams into a new division is an exciting opportunity to enhance our customer offering and therefore deliver faster growth in this area of the company.

“Europa has provided air and ocean logistics since 1976, growing it organically alongside its road freight offering but never as a separate division. With 95% of UK imports arriving by sea and 40% by value arriving by air, this sector is vitally important to any logistics operator and our restructure demonstrates our approach.

“Allowing customers to speak directly to air and sea specialists will ensure that we find the right solution for their requirements, and that we can support our customers with expert knowledge where required.”

Europa’s newly centralised sea freight operation will be based in Birmingham and its airfreight operation in Heathrow. Europa also has a successful air and sea business in Hong Kong. The Hong Kong company was jointly owned with another investor. However the investor’s shares have now been bought back, so that the company is a wholly owned subsidiary.

As part of the investment Europa has created a new role of National Seafreight Manager, bringing in Rebecca Jenkinson who has a track record in ocean logistics who will head up the Birmingham seafreight team.  Rebecca has moved over to Europa after working at Expeditors in Birmingham for 11 years.

Rebecca was attracted to Europa because she was convinced that the Board was serious about investing in seafreight.  She commented “Europa has an impressive track record but hearing about the future plans for the business convinced me there is a great opportunity here to drive the seafreight product and to be innovative.”

Karl Saunders, National Airfreight Manager, has 35 years’ experience in the airfreight industry and has been at Europa Worldwide since 1999. Karl heads up the team at Heathrow and comments “It’s an exciting time here at Europa, the recalibration and investment gives added focus to our Operations and Sales teams and will enable our continuing development of products and services for our customers“.

In addition Miles O’Donnell has been appointed to the role of National Sales Manager for Air and Sea, and is responsible for a team of dedicated Air and Sea sales people.

Europa has already reorganised its road freight sales and customer services functions with 77 existing staff moving roles and nine new staff recruited. The new roles include 30 account managers, 11 branch managers and 46 customer service positions all of which are intended to better service customer needs.

Europa, which is one of the largest privately owned transport and logistics companies in the UK, was acquired by Andrew Baxter in August last year. At the time he announced plans for significant investment in the business.  This has already delivered two major projects – it’s branch network has been extended with two new sales offices in Leeds and Nottingham plus construction is about to start on a new state-of-the-art 262,500 sq ft (24,387 sq mt) head office and south of England hub, at Prologis Park near Dartford.

Andrew Baxter, Managing Director, added “This is another example of how we are refining our operations to make them more customer and market focused.   We are serious about investing further in our services to help maximise our potential. These changes give a clear vision and direction to our air and sea business that will enable us to expand significantly in the coming years.”

 

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