fastway courier franchise

loofer

There's a somebody selling the franchise for a defined area for an international courier franchise

details are here http://filesus.fastway.org/CFsForSale/8/Salford_Quays_Salford.pdf

although price has been reduced significantly from advertised.
Price includes van and apparently no further franchise fees.

I've searched on this forum and there's not much about fastway. Mainly ppl who have enquired about setting them self up as a courier independently or using DHL@home.

Anybody got any info/experience of the Fastway franchise? or in general operating as a courier under a national brand?

The business model is set up in a way that you can develop your patch and then sell it on or split it up to sell parts of it.

What kind of questions should I ask the owner?

pelirocco

the one local to us went bust a few months ago .

You should be asking the owner to see his accounts for the last few years and up to date management figures , if he is selling an establised business , you would also have to contact fastways to see if he is allowed to sell the francise on , and what if any fees are due to them now or in the future.

The one that was local to us used to sell blocks of tickets which you then used when you wanted a parcel to be sent , they were the cheapest by far , but maybe that was the problem?

paulwf

The first thing I'd be doing is to look at what your costs are likely to be in the future. My main concern is that if fuel and general motoring costs are a significant factor then you might be stuffed a couple of years down the line. What will traffic be like in your area bearing in mind all major road schemes have been cancelled.

Who are your competitors and how is the market changing? Will the sell off of Royal Mail have any significance? What sort of companies use your services and are they expanding on closing up?

Basically 5 years can fly by in business, have a think about how sustainable your business will be in the future not just now. I've seen courier costs (as a customer) shoot up and I'm not sure for how long that can continue.

Forris

Here's what I know about Fastway:

New Zealand based company, started in UK a couple of years ago.

They sell franchises for specific postcode sectors, which can be expanded or you can take on a region which comprises a number of routes - see http://www.fastwaycouriers.co.uk/8FranchOpp_CF_New.html

As has been said, the courier has to sell packs of labels to companies that wish to send parcels. This replaces the usual practise of signing a customer up to a contract. Their main selling point is that they are very cheap for 'intra-region' parcels, while still being competitive for parcels going further afield. The latter is achieved by having a national contract with a major carrier and handing those items over to them for final delivery. The cheap 'local' rate can only be realistically achieved if the regional franchise is set up correctly.

For a successful regional operation, it needs to have a regional franchisee with their own depot where the local routes can operate from.

Example -Region consists of 5 routes (North, South, East, West, Central).
Parcel collected by South route for delivery to North area is handled 'in-house' and is charged at Rate 1;
Parcel collected for delivery to neighbouring region is charged at a Rate 2;
Parcel collected for delivery further afield is charged at Rate 3;
Parcel for delivery outside of Fastway network (they are struggling to achieve national coverage) is handed to the major carrier (was PF, now DHL I think) and charged at the highest rate. This is still cheaper than standard tariff due to Fastway having a contract with the carrier.

There are lots of variables to think about when undertaking this type of business. If you have not done multi-drop before (and I mean 80+ stops per day) then it would be worth doing a couple of weeks with an agency or asking a current franchisee if you can ride with them for a few days. Its a lot harder than most people think.

I am a self-employed courier and if I can help further then feel free to ask.

more_money_for_me

A lot of these things have been mentioned, but as I work in the distribution industry they are worth stressing:

Cost of fuel, vehicle tax, insurance etc have all risen considerably and look set to keep going the same way.

This is a cheap courier service (we use them occasionally) this is good for getting lots of volume, but what does it do for your margin?

This is a really hard job, are you ready for it with relatively low rewards?

Knowing the area you are thinking of buying in, what are the insurance implications. When I lived there I did agency work for parcelforce and twice had my van "done". This was quite normal and gaffer just laughed as it happened so often. This is a few years ago but this area at the time (more than 5 years ago) did have additional risk.

What is the competition like, what do local independants charge, what do other nationals charge?

See the books

Why does current franchisee want to sell?

paulwf

Just from an initial look at their website and franchisee pages their business model does seem to be obsessed with growing an area then making money by splitting it rather than building a profitable, sustainable area based on passion for the business. Of course businesses want to expand but good franchises aren't usually trying to split areas into smaller and smaller chunks. It seems vaguely like a pyramid scheme way of working (to be clear I'm not in any way saying it is a pyramid scheme just it is acting similar to one).

Graham_S

Avoid at all costs

greenface

Graham_S wrote: »

Avoid at all costs

care to add a bit more info to this statement

gm_gm

greenface wrote: »

care to add a bit more info to this statement

We have used Fastway for volume business [1,000 - 2,000 items per month] for the last 2 years and have always found them good.

The problem is they went under yesterday leaving us with big problems and £575 out of pocket which is a shame