#ThrowbackThursday: HSF Logistics

 

#ThrowbackThursday So I’m preparing to take my first driver CPC on Saturday and I’m doing a short little bit at the start just to run through who I am and to show that I’m talking to them from a place of experience, by the time we get to this picture, not long after the Nolan’s picture it’ll be perfect time to make a joke because let’s face it, working for Nolan’s and HSF in the first five years of your driving career is quite funny! And a blatant ‘been there done that’ without having to utter that bullshit line!

I left Nolan’s to follow Dad into agency in North London, back in the days when the only thing stopping you was how long it took to get from one customer to the next. We’d regularly be in say Iceland Enfield at 4am, work 15 hours, then off somewhere to do a night trunk before being back into Iceland next morning! Money was insane. It went dead in January so I rang up HSF and off I went. With another driver for 4 days then to Nijmegen where I got my truck. I lived in St Helens at the time. Normally new starters got the asthmatic 380 Scania 4 Series. What possessed a company than ran heavy with meat most of time to buy 380’s is beyond me! me!

But, living in St Helens they had one of the Dumeco liveried double deckers available. Standard height fridge, 4m being limit in Europe, but with double deck adjustable bars in back. It was also a fairly new Volvo FH 460. It put a few noses out of joint as I continued my luck of having great vehicles to drive wherever I worked! It was about where you lived as a regular run was Fridays load Nijemegan, down road to top up with satay sticks that you’d deliver on Saturday to 2 or 3 places, having driven all night to get there. Company used to give us boxes of satay sticks which would be fuel for my next day!

Yes, the fabled day/night/day. When I went to interview, one of only jobs I’ve ever been interviewed for he sat down and one of first things he asked was did I know how HSF operated. I said a little, he looked down at my CV and saw my first truck driving job was Nolan’s and smiled and said ‘yeah, I see Nolan’s on your CV I think you’re gonna be alright’! And I was. The day night day was mostly getting off boat or starting Netherlands or Belgium, doing your delivery, then doing lots of collections. Their planning was like clockwork. Then when you’d done enough you’d get the wonderful ‘come to Nijmegen’ down the phone from the planner.

That was the first ⅓ of your shift over. In Nijmegen you’d tip yourself into correct lanes then sort your own run out and when everything was in and you could get on a bay load yourself up. The sooner you left the better it was, but it was never early, usually around midnight. Close doors, pop lock on, and point it to Calais for train. Earliest to get away were London markets as they needed to be there asap. You’d have drops then all day stretching across the country. Once you’d done 36 hours, your day/night/day you had every right to say I’m booking off. Jobs like this suited me so well as I’ve never needed much sleep. Still don’t, only sleep 5 or 6 hours a night now. I ended up I realised after gaining a bit of a reputation as a nutcase because I just never stopped. I came and went from HSF for 3 years on and off and yeah it was incredibly hard work but I had a f**king fantastic time, not least because the core of drivers who stuck around were great, still in contact with some. You learn to see if you see another driver again before getting too friendly! You’d often see a new driver in Nijmegen on his first day night day and you’d never see him again as HSF broke him as it did so so many. 

Then one day Virginia came calling to make the rest of my dreams come true. Thanks for reading!