Dart Group PLC

International Directory of Company Histories, Volume 77 (2006) by Frederick Ingram

Dart Group PLC

Dart Group PLC

Building 470 Bournemouth International Airport Christchurch, BH23 6SE United Kingdom Telephone: 44 (0) 1202 597676 Fax: 44 (0) 1202 593480 Web site: http://www.dartgroup.co.uk

Public Company Incorporated: 1983 as Channel Express Group Limited Employees: 1,700 Sales: £268.0 million (EUR 389 million) (2005) Stock Exchanges: AIM Ticker Symbol: DTG.L NAIC: 484110 General Freight Trucking, Local; 481111 Scheduled Passenger Air Transportation; 481112 Scheduled Freight Air Transportation; 481211 Nonscheduled Chartered Passenger Air Transportation; 492110 Couriers; 551112 Offices of Other Holding Companies

Dart Group PLC is the holding company for several subsidiaries providing temperature-controlled distribution and aviation services in the United Kingdom and Europe. The distribution side has been delivering fresh flowers and grocers to U.K. wholesalers since its Channel Island beginnings in the early 1970s. By 1978, the company was operating its own planes and in 2001 began flying passenger flights. In 2003 Dart launched a low cost passenger airline known as Jet2.com.

More than one million passengers a year fly Jet2.com, which has bases in Leeds, Manchester, Belfast, and other cities and flies as far as Hungary and Spain. Dart owns about two dozen jets and also has an aviation parts trading business. The fleet of subsidiary Fowler Welch-Coolchain has about 750 refrigerated trailers, covering a network from the Netherlands to northern England.

ORIGINS

Dart Group PLC traces its origins to two businesses formed in 1971 by Art Carpenter. Carpenter's Air Services contracted space on cargo airlines to ship fresh flowers from the Channel Island of Guernsey, while Carpenter's Transport arranged for their wholesale delivery.

Another produce, flower, and freight shipping business, Express Air Freight (CI), was set up in 1975 with Art Carpenter as director. Express Air Freight began using its own aircraft, a Handley Page Dart Herald, in 1978. The next year, another company, Express Air Services, was formed to take over the aviation operation. In 1980 Express Air Services won its first mail contract, flying between Bournemouth, Bristol, and Liverpool.

GOING PUBLIC IN 1988

By 1985, the company had three Dart Heralds in its fleet. Aviation services was growing, with new contracts to deliver parcels and newspapers, while the distribution business was also seeing more volume. The company had 200 employees by 1988, as well as 31 trucks, 46 trailers, and seven Dart Herald planes. The company added a new aircraft type, the Lockheed Electra, in 1989. Three more were added within five years and Dart also worked out a deal with Zantop Airlines of the United States to lease additional Electras as needed.

In 1988, Channel Express Group PLC had an initial public offering on the U.K. Unlisted Securities Market. Shares began trading on the London Stock Exchange in 1991, when the company was renamed Dart Group PLC, after the Rolls Royce-manufactured powerplants in its Dart Heralds. Three years later, these planes began to be replaced by Fokker F27s, which were also powered by Dart engines.

Benair Freight Ltd., a freight forwarding company with offices in the United Kingdom and Far East, was acquired in 1990. It was renamed Benair Freight International Ltd. four years later. Benair developed a specialty in shipping tropical fish and other time-sensitive cargo.

Dart also owned Deltec Aviation Services Ltd., an avionics repair company. It acquired Bourne Aviation Supply Limited, an aircraft parts distributor, in 1992 for about £1 million.

Dart Group had annual revenues of more than £30 million by the early 1990s. The company struggled to maintain its margins in a global economy troubled by military conflict in the Persian Gulf. The Channel Express unit, long identified with the island of Guernsey, was developing into a regional European cargo carrier. It was handling shipments for the likes of UPS and British Airways World Cargo.

Another temperature-controlled distributor, Fowler Welch Ltd., was acquired in 1994. Fowler Welch was based in Spalding, Lincolnshire, and handled horticultural products as well as the region's produce. The existing Channel Express distribution business was merged with Fowler Welch in 1996. Dart was investing millions in capital upgrades at its Fowler Welch facilities, expanding its 90,000-square-foot temperature controlled warehouse in Spalding to 150,000 square feet. By this time, Fowler Welch had about 200 trucks and 300 trailers. It was delivering for several major U.K. supermarkets as well as about 40 wholesale markets.

JETS ACQUIRED 1996

In 1996, the Channel Express Air Services unit began acquiring Airbus A300 airliners for conversion into freighters by BAE Systems Aviation Services, a process which took about four months. The first aircraft was dubbed the "Eurofreighter." By 1998, the company had three of these jets in the fleet.

In 1999 the temperature-controlled distribution business continued to grow with the £14.2 million purchase of the Coolchain Group. Coolchain was based in Teynham, Kent, a fruit-growing area, and had annual revenues approaching £20 million. The Coolchain buy was augmented the next year by the acquisition of A Wood & Son. Fowler Welch and Coolchain were merged into Fowler-Welch Coolchain Ltd. in 2003.