PRIME MINISTER VISITS ABBY COURIERS

Prime Minister Gordon Brown visited Abby Couriers in Luckyn Lane, Basildon today accompanied by Duncan Bannatyne from Dragon’s Den and praised the firm for its entrepreneurial attitude and the way it had grown during the recession.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown visited Abby Couriers in Luckyn Lane, Basildon today accompanied by Duncan Bannatyne from Dragon’s Den and praised the firm for its entrepreneurial attitude and the way it had grown during the recession.

Accompanying the Prime Minister during his visit were Labour Candidates for three constituencies – Angela Smith of South Basildon and East Thurrock, Allan Davies of Basildon ad Billericay and Mike Le Surf of Rayleigh and Wickford.

Managing Director of Abby Couriers, Mark Giles, said: “It was a great honour to welcome the Prime Minister to Abby Couriers and he had clearly been very well briefed by Angela Smith on what the firm has done since we moved to Basildon from West Horndon two years ago.

“We have taken full advantage of the Government schemes available to help small businesses being the first in the country to get support through the Enterprise Finance Guarantee scheme which enabled us to invest in three electric powered vehicles.

“Abby Couriers was the first independent courier company to use electric vehicles on scheduled delivery routes in London which is one of the most environmentally friendly ways on delivering parcels available.

“The Prime Minister was particularly interested in how these vehicles had helped us deliver an improved service while reducing our costs and cutting our carbon footprint.

“We have also utilised the opportunities available through the apprenticeship scheme with one apprentice in accounts and the in our logistics planning team.

“A £200,000 grant allowed us to  invest in training for our drivers by developing a new NVQ specifically for the courier industry and  our first 39 drivers have now gained this new qualification with another 50 about to start the course.

“As a family business we know the value of investing in our staff and developing their expertise and the Prime Minister was very interested in how a firm of our size is investing in training and skills development.

“We were also able to share with him our plans for the future development and expansion of our firm which both he and Duncan Bannatyne found interesting.

“This was a great opportunity to share with the Prime Minister some of the challenges and successes that Abby Couriers has met during the last couple of years and we found him extremely interested in what we had done and he praised the entrepreneurial spirit of small businesses which had responded to the recession in similar ways to ourselves.”

Founded in 1994 Abby Couriers is a family run firm with a Head Office in Luckyn Lane, Basildon – more details at www.abbycouriers.com

With almost 200 staff the firm has more than 175 drivers on the road providing Same Day Delivery Services across the United Kingdom and Europe for key clients who include DHL, FEDEX and TNT.

Abby Couriers is a member of the National Courier Association, the Federation of Small Businesses and Essex Chambers of Commerce.

During 2009 Abby Couriers won the Business to Business category in the Essex County Business Awards; the Staff Training and Development and the Business to Business Awards in the Basildon District Business Awards and the Green Business Award in the North and West London Business Awards.