Welcome to Tappers

End of year thoughts....

As 2009 draws to a close, we thought we would take the opportunity to thank you all for your support yet again. It has been a tough year for all of us, but we have watched with pride as all the staff here have recognised the changed environment, adjusted to it and just got on with it.

One of the bigger challenges has been gaining smooth access to the Auckland waterfront given their apparent shortage of resources since they amalgamated the Bledisloe and Fergusson container terminals and laid off a lot of staff. Our email this morning tells us that they have formed a joint venture, Conlinxx and are entering the container transport market.

At this point, we don’t feel too threatened by that. If they run their transport company as efficiently as they run the port, we are reasonably safe!

This year has seen an exciting development for us. We have been quietly operating a shuttle train twice a day from the port to Southdown railhead carrying 20 teu each way – a total of 80 teu per day. While this only represents about 16% of our total container movements, it is an encouraging start.

With bigger things in mind, we have leased 10,000 sq. metres of land from Ontrack/KiwiRail and will base our container hub on that land from March 1st next year. This is a really big break through for us and we look forward to discussing its potential with you all next year.

So, thanks again for your business and all of us here look forward to taking container transport to a new level next year. In short, bring it on!

Have a great Christmas and a happy New Year.