Friday 10 October 2014

EYMS put Whittles up for sale

EYMS have put their Kidderminster based operation Whittles up for sale, reports busandcoach.com. EYMS have owned Whittles for a decade and the decision is apparently due to several years of operating losses. If a sale cannot be completed, closure has not been ruled out. Last year EYMS sold their Manchester based Finglands operation.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

How long will it be before we see the whole company up for sale. In the past 12 months we have seen Finglands in Manchester and the Driffield Depot close.
I am sure those in the know will say that subsidy cuts have affected the bus industry but there are still plenty of local companies making money whilst the big groups are still in there as well, so is Peter Shipp out of touch or were his company purchases too far from Hull..

Anonymous said...

Or maybe Peter Shipp is slimming down EYMS so he can sell it off for his pension. I could only see Go-Ahead buying the company. That is just talk.

Anonymous said...

Apparently a staff notice on display in all the garages lays the blame as usual on subsidy payments, but also states that the coaching arm and National Express were only just making money. If that is the case why does Peter still insist on signing up for Nat Ex work way out of his region and why keep putting new coaches into Whittles.
It would be interesting to see just how much Whittles has been subsidised.
We know Finglands had over £200,000 put into each year.

I feel sorry for his workforce who seem to be getting 1% pay rises whilst the company seem happy to throw money into big loss making ventures.

And just look at the work which EYMS have lost over the past 12 months.

Hull Park & Ride, school contracts, etc etc etc.

Is this bad middle management, or is Peter Shipp so far out of touch and just uses his employees and buses as a hobby.

It seems the only way forward for EYMS is to sell out now whilst they still have something to sell.

Anonymous said...

I watch that Ch5 documentary, and the staff are very passionate but I had to wonder about management and peter himself.

Here is the press release:
http://www.whittlecoach.co.uk/141008%20PR%20Whittles%20sale.pdf

Anonymous said...

The Channel 5 programme appeared to be very well edited with only Scarborough and Hull shown. There was no video showing the disgruntled staff at Driffield or any other depots, all of which had been filmed.
Peter Shipp has shovelled hundreds of thousands of pounds into two loss making business ventures at the expense of his staff up here in the north.
That is total bad management especially when he cries the poor sob story at every chance he gets.

And now he is left with virtually nothing. How long will it be before we see Stagecoach stickers on the side of EYMS buses.

The way things seem to be going it would seem to be closer than people think