Davies Turner – the UK’s leading independent freight forwarder – is continuing to reinvest around its main regional freight hubs across the UK and Ireland. The company currently benefits from growing demand for its combination of multimodal freight forwarding, warehousing, distribution and value added services. “Our aim is as ever to offer customers the complete supply chain management package, together with our global network of consolidation services,” according to Philip Stephenson, chairman of the Davies Turner Group. “We continue to grow with a mixture of retail and industrial business, exports and re-exports as well as consumer imports. This mix is essential to smooth out the seasonal peaks and troughs which can otherwise put space availability under strain, for instance in the run-up to Christmas." Earlier this year the company started operations at its third warehouse in Avonmouth, having first installed racking with 11,400 pallet locations. This adds a further 70,000 sq ft with 12.5 m high eaves, again in a secure yard with access control. Now the Bristol hub has doubled this capacity by leasing the building next door with similar dimensions and loading docks. At Cumbernauld, Davies Turner’s main overland and ocean freight hub in Scotland’s Central Belt, the company has purchased the freehold of its existing premises, plus another 1.5 acres of adjacent developable land, which can be used to increase the size of the existing warehouse when required. Meanwhile, at its Heathrow HQ, Davies Turner Air Cargo has built additional office space as well as a new temperature controlled storage facility, geared to handle the company’s increasing involvement in pharma logistics. The facility offers comprehensive control and temperature logging electronics to comply with the latest customer requirements in this sector. This follows earlier investment in a new scissor lift, powered loading bed and 5 ton pallet mover at its Heathrow distribution centre for handling skids and ULDs (Unit Load Devices). These recent developments follow the expansion at the company’s Hams Hall freight hub in the Midlands over the last two years. Stephenson adds: “Since we purchased the 73,000 sq ft cross-dock at Hams Hall, which has 40 loading doors, we have added a 35,000 sq ft heavy duty mezzanine and another 7,000 sq ft of canopies, creating 115,000 sq ft of operational floor space in all, or 11,000 sq m, in a large secure yard totalling just over 6 acres (2.5 hectares). “This is strategically located next to the Hams Hall rail terminal and just a few hundred metres from Davies Turner’s two high-bay logistics warehouses at Coleshill.”