The reality is that the economics of operating any bus company of any size and ownership structure / operating model is hugely challenging at the moment. That’s why we’re seeing smaller operators close down, either in a planned or unplanned way, and larger operators close depots and divest themselves of underperforming parts of their business.
The reality is, for an independent operator, you need to do one of two things if you’re going to run local bus work. You either need to have a solid coach hire operation which covers your core overheads, and run buses as a sideline (be it commercial, contracted or just rail / schools), or you need to build up a network of commercial bus services.
The latter option might look easier (after all, any operator can run a bus anywhere, any time), but finding a route that the local “big” operator doesn’t want but that still pays its way is very tricky. And even more so in Nottingham where you have a high quality local independent in Trent Barton, alongside a municipal (NCT) that runs a much larger urban network than would be ran if the city was in the hands of a big group.
CT4N for many years were sustained by a City Council who - inexplicably, given they own most of NCT - tendered much of their supported bus network in such a way that the wider commercial sector weren’t massively interested. Medilink the time before Skills won it was tendered on the basis of taking on and running a fleet of early electric technology buses, maintaining but not owning them - unsurprisingly the (many) coach operators around Nottingham who also run buses as a sideline didn’t fancy that!
CT4N’s failure is neither an indictment of their operating model, nor their management. There were positives and negatives to both (as there are with every business). The failure is as a result of a changing market that, as can happen in many industries, simply doesn’t have a place for an operator whose principal focus is contracted bus work. Their cost base was inflated by importing some “big operator” things like having a recognised Trade Union (nothing wrong with that but it pushes your cost base up and smaller independents tend not to have it), but ultimately despite best efforts at diversification, the market has shown that there simply wasn’t enough of the right type of work out there to keep their operation viable.
