A new name, a new expanded portfolio of services, but still the same reputation.

Marshall Fleet Solutions is a brand new name in the Commercial Transportation industry, but it is far from being a new organisation. It incorporates both Marshall Thermo King, founded in 1972 and Marshall VTR Tail Lift which started trading in 1978, as well as consolidating a raft of other commercial ancillary services which have developed over the last 3 decades. MD, Nigel Faben explains the reason for the new name. “The commercial demands placed on hauliers and fleet managers today mean that they cannot afford to keep taking vehicles off the road for routine servicing or regulatory inspections. We have responded to this demand over the years by adding a wide range of commercial vehicle maintenance skills to our service offering, but many people still think of us primarily as a refrigeration company, due to the Marshall Thermoking brand. The name Marshall Fleet Solutions reflects the one-stop-shop solution that we now provide.”

This view is endorsed by Paul Wallace, MD of Trailernet whose fleet are all covered by flexible contract maintenance agreements with Marshall. “If we send a trailer to one of the Marshall depots for a statutory tail-lift inspection, and the technician notices it needs some general bodywork repairs, it makes sense to complete the whole lot at the same time. And if we can bring forward a routine refrigeration service to be carried out during the same visit so we don’t have to bring the vehicle back the following week, so much the better!”

Consolidating the various teams from the different divisions has required significant planning and investment. The mobile engineering workforce has been expanded to over 150 engineers who now cover the whole of the UK including Scotland. Marshall’s own Training Centre has devised customised training programmes for those wishing to up-skill and cross-train. A comprehensive refit of service vans was required to cater for the additional tools and parts and new equipment such as Weight Testing facilities have been installed in all of the company’s 13 regional service centres.

Nigel Faben concludes “We have spent most of the last 2 years preparing for this re-brand as Marshall Fleet Solutions, so that we could proudly announce our capabilities to the industry at large. This is now especially important given the current tough economic climate.”