Problems facing small bus operators (Austin Blackburn)

[tfw756rider]

As I said though, the listings are even older (from 2022 and 2024).

 

[Flange Squeal]

I think the clue is at the top of the page. "Updated - 06/05/2025".

Exactly, hence a bit pointless anyone trying to use it to prove a point on here!

 

[tfw756rider]

Exactly, hence a bit pointless anyone trying to use it to prove a point on here!

And again, the listings are even older, from 2022 and 2024.

 

[RJ]

There does seem to be something of an echo in this thread, the point was made hours ago

 

[Jonny]

Austin Blackburn from Go-Coach (and for a short while was associated with Hulleys) recently gave a very interesting talk to the Friends of LT Museum, https://www.youtube.com/live/gvjKScBbMz0?t=565s part of which centred on the difficulties facing small bus operators. For example:

• staff retention - some companies are losing 60% of their staff each year, and the costs of advertising for jobs, recruitment, training etc are not inconsiderable
• impact of diesel price increases on small operators who can't afford to hedge contracts - Go-Coach's diesel bill has soared from £12,000 per week at the start of the year to £20,000 per week now
• the prohibitive cost of installing electric chargers for small companies - Austin quoted a cost of £1m per kilometre, and his depot is 1.2 Km from the nearest substation
• the difficulties in recruiting potential managers - managers who 'grew' from drivers is less likely now since 18 year olds are not recruited as drivers since the insurance cost is too high. 18 year olds thus go and work in a different industry where they can progress
• the lack of good small Solos on the second-hand market - there are no mini-buses available, and Solos stopped being made a few years back (except for a small batch for Stagecoach and others) Whjat will happen when the small Solos are time expired?

Do small operators have a future?

To come back to the issue of setting up charging, in itself there may be the possibility of relocating premises to near(er) a substation, slowly-charged storage batteries that discharge rapidly when a vehicle needs to be recharged, using solar (and/or other micro-generation), or some combination of them. The solos issue is somewhat interlinked, it may need to be replaced by van-derived minibuses that could be electric, and charged at a location nearer to a substation.

 

[MotCO]

To come back to the issue of setting up charging, in itself there may be the possibility of relocating premises to near(er) a substation, slowly-charged storage batteries that discharge rapidly when a vehicle needs to be recharged, using solar (and/or other micro-generation), or some combination of them. The solos issue is somewhat interlinked, it may need to be replaced by van-derived minibuses that could be electric, and charged at a location nearer to a substation.

Go-Coach operate from the former London Country garage at Swanley, and modernised with pits, offices etc. To find similar suitable premises nearby, at a suitable price is unlikely.

I agree that storage batteries (which I believe are used on the Greenford battery train line to recharge the trains) could be an option. Solar panels are not that useful since buses are charged overnight, unless solar power can somehow be stored.

 

[RT4038]

Has anyone told Lonsdale Buses this (between Carnforth and Morecambe 5 minutes ahead of long established Stagecoach service)

It remains to be seen how this pans out.....

I disagree, I think it is a natural consequence of the fact that smaller operators will generally be operating the sorts of rural and housing estate routes which are most suited to a Solo/Solo SR or a Streetlite WF. But, as above, the market has gone for those buses.

So the market has gone for those types of buses. The sorts of rural and housing estate routes which may have been 'commercial' in the past using such vehicles has pretty much slipped into the tendered market now. Manufacturers clearly don't see any profitable market in producing such things. So the only hope for a small operator is to bid for a contract on the basis of buying a new Mellor Strata or something, which will probably be worn out on such work after about five years anyway.

Sort of. Not deliberately though.

Well, not particularly deliberately, but as a consequence of 'driving up standards' , particularly with PSVAR (Accessibility regs.), BODS compliance (Bus Operator Data Service, AV (Audio Visual) , multi operator ticketing, DVSA standards, Franchising, Procurement rules, Reimbursements both concessionary and Fare Caps etc etc . All of which has put additional burdens of administration and compliance proportionately more on smaller operators than large.

Now the whole point of franchising is to prevent that issue where the big operator creams off the profit during the day and leaves the taxpayer to pick up the tab for the rest. Sadly, the consequence of that is that the whole route will be franchised in one go, first bus to last bus seven days a week. So where does that leave the indy running the Sunday tender?

That business will disappear. I'm not sure how widespread this type of tender and it being operated by smaller independents is? Certainly not around my area of residence.

I think there probably is but it's at the margins, both geographically and commercially.

As we've seen with many large operators, they've drawn their horns and retreated from lower margin routes and more rural areas e.g. First Eastern Counties are now confined to the Excel route, and their Norwich/Gt Yarmouth/Lowestoft bases and have incrementally ceded territory to other firms. That has opened up opportunities for independents and you can see that in other places too e.g. north and mid Wales, Co Durham, etc.

Quite. There are some smaller operators who have made it their business to keep abreast of all the requirements, to understand their costs and how they are to be covered and have a viable business. Not for the feint hearted and/ or undercapitalised though.

 

[mangad]

That business will disappear. I'm not sure how widespread this type of tender and it being operated by smaller independents is? Certainly not around my area of residence.

Prior to franchising in Greater Manchester, it was not unheard of for a bus route to be commercial during the day, but subsidised during evenings and Sundays.

Then you sometimes got situations where the daytime and evening services were different tenders because new funding had come along. For example, the 375 from Stockport was a subsidised service run by Little Gem during the day. A few years ago TfGM got funding for an evening and Sunday service on part of the route, and this was a different contract and run by Stagecoach. When Little Gem went under, you then had the weird situation that there was no longer a daytime service as they struggled to get a new operator, but the evenings and Sundays continued (a replacement route was introduced for daytime, but the evening/Sunday service continued unchanged all the way until franchising.)

Now, it must be said, there were not many small operators left in Greater Manchester by the end of deregulation. But Nexus Move was running the Sunday service on the subsidised 343, whilst Stotts did it the rest of the week. Similarly on the 341 Stotts did the rest of the week whilst Stagecoach did Sundays.

But yes, all that went away with franchising. There isn't a need to split it up contracts like that. If you want to change the service levels, you just need to agree it with the relevant franchise operator.

 

[RJ]

Relying on cast off buses and cast off staff for a 'low cost' operation is rarely a long term business.

Is there a future for small operators - yes, of course. Running School buses, contracts, private hires, rail replacement etc. Registered Local bus services for the hardy, and hats off for those who do.

I buy and operate fully depreciated buses. The newest I run is a 2015 Euro 6 Citaro but it doesn’t make any more or less than the older buses.

May not be very glamorous, but it is sustainable. It takes away the risk of not being able to keep up with finance payments because of operational costs going in the wrong direction, adhoc workstreams going quiet or losing some contract work. My operation is micro in size and the model relies on low mileage and low overheads, so there's a bit of margin there to withstand spikes to costs to a fair extent.

Any bigger than three buses and you get into the realms of much bigger overheads then having to run more buses to keep pace with them. You may have to start doing Category D training, or open and staff a workshop, or take on admin staff/managers, or get bigger premises, more mileage and drivers may mean more unwanted expenses to deal with etc. Speaking to some small operators, it seems there's a bit of a black spot between being micro with high margins and being fairly sizeable and relying on volume at lower margins where it's hard to make money. Of course, everyone does things differently and many do make it work.

With respect to work, depending on where you set up, there are a few options out there to keep the lights on. Personally I don't advertise for any custom, do any tendered work or do any stage carriage work at the moment, though I do intend to operate a seasonal route I have created myself one day. Some work is expensive or risky to cover and I take my hat off to those who make it work.

 

[Tetchytyke]

That business will disappear. I'm not sure how widespread this type of tender and it being operated by smaller independents is? Certainly not around my area of residence.

It’s common in West Yorkshire and it’s also common in Tyne and Wear, where the daytime service was commercial and the evening/Sunday service was tendered. Sometimes it went to the daytime operator but often it didn’t. In Tyne and Wear Gateshead Central Taxis picked up a lot of this sort of work and there’s TLC in West Yorkshire.

But yes, this work will go with franchising, you put the whole route in one deal.

 

[stevieinselby]

That business will disappear. I'm not sure how widespread this type of tender and it being operated by smaller independents is? Certainly not around my area of residence.

Indeed. And in some cases, it's the small independents running the daytime service who don't want the evening and Sunday tenders – Connexions famously refuse to operate in the evenings or on Sundays, so various evening and/or Sunday permutations and variations of some of their routes are run by First, East Yorkshire and Transdev.

 

[Observer]

The thing about the Optare Solo, if they had just offered the designs to another manufacturer, someone would have taken it up, the deal by Stagecoach a few years ago clearly showed there was still interest.

Not everything can go electric just yet. And as for the Mercedes Sprinter options, they might work well in some cases but not all. Don't think jamming 21 bodies in those things would be very comfortable.

 

[Andyh82]

I’m also convinced if they were still making the solo, they’d still be selling them.

It’s like Ford stopping making the Fiesta when it was Britain’s most popular car!

 

[MotCO]

The thing about the Optare Solo, if they had just offered the designs to another manufacturer, someone would have taken it up, the deal by Stagecoach a few years ago clearly showed there was still interest.

I had wondered whether Mellor would have wanted to buy the designs. I'm not sure if there was any other small manufacturer who would be able to.

 

[37114]

The thing about the Optare Solo, if they had just offered the designs to another manufacturer, someone would have taken it up, the deal by Stagecoach a few years ago clearly showed there was still interest.

Not everything can go electric just yet. And as for the Mercedes Sprinter options, they might work well in some cases but not all. Don't think jamming 21 bodies in those things would be very comfortable.

ADL briefly tried to buy Optare to get their hands on the Solo (and presumably take a competitor out of the market)

 

[Travelmonkey]

Not everything can go electric just yet. And as for the Mercedes Sprinter options, they might work well in some cases but not all. Don't think jamming 21 bodies in those things would be very comfortable.

Untill recently one of my local tenders was doing just that, although the mercs have moved on so it's back to the Ex London E200s again,

They seem to be more a fad for DRT so when that fizzles out wonder what will happen to all the 20 + & 70 + plate minibuses,

I do wonder if DRT will be something of a lifeline to smaller operators short term, it helped Austin's firm survive the pandemic, although like all tenders it can be contentious. I used nottsbus recently one run was by a council owned minibus (some fiat thing) and the other 2 by stagecoach, a merc sprinter with tail lift and a low floor.

It certainly adds to the faff having to be 4 point secured, at least on most solos I can reverse in, breaks on and go.