Motoring

New £4m distribution centre opens as part of five-year plan to drive growth at family firm

Marc Trent, Managing Director, in Trent's new £4m 30,000 sq ft distribution centre. Picture: Dorset Biz News.

By Staff Reporter [email protected]

Published: February 26, 2021 | Updated: 26th February 2021

One of Dorset’s best-known and longest-established family firms has launched the first stage of a five-year growth plan predicted to boost turnover to a quarter of a billion pounds.

Charles Trent Ltd, which was founded in 1926, is already among the UK’s top three vehicle salvage and recycling companies.

Its new 30,000 sq ft distribution centre has now officially come on stream and is the first of up to six other locations across the country.

A video of the facility can be seen here.

60,000 green parts can be stored and distributed from the Holton Heath site, ranging from used parts such as engines and gearboxes to small parts and interiors.

That number is expected to nearly double to 110,000 this year and reach 170,000 by 2022.

The Poole-based company, now run by the fourth generation of the Trent family, has invested £4m in the centre which is 14 levels high and has a top picking height of 13 metres.

The latest equipment and systems include two brand new Linde K series electric turret trucks used to reach anything from four levels up.

Nine people are employed in the centre which operates 18 hours a day, Monday to Friday.

Marc Trent, Managing Director, said: “This is the only distribution centre of its kind in the country.

“It puts us at the forefront of our industry and is as far away from the old image of someone wandering around a scrapyard that you can imagine.

“It’s more like an Amazon approach where you can source a particular part online and then have it delivered next day.

“I have travelled the world to see what other companies are doing and have met with the Board of LKQ Corporation in America which owns Euro Car Parts in this country.

Marc with Matt Groves, Distribution Manager.

“This is the future and we’re now doing it in Dorset.”

Trent, which has sites in Poole and Rugby, Warwickshire, recycled more than 38,000 vehicles in 2020.

They range from everyday models to cars costing up to £230,000 including a Ford GT40 and Aston Martin DB11.

The company’s specialist vehicle dismantling and depolluting equipment allows it to recycle over 95 per cent of every vehicle that arrives on site.

Clients include some of the UK’s largest insurance companies.

Services range from used car parts and online motor salvage auctions to scrap car collection and the sale of wheels, tyres and batteries.

Fifth generation: Marc Trent with niece, Emilie Trent, and son, Jordan.

It ships to more than 60 countries worldwide with France, Italy, Germany, Spain and the USA among its top customers.

In its latest published accounts for the year to January 31, 2020, Charles Trent Ltd made a pre-tax profit of £2.479m on a turnover of £29.37m.

Under the company’s five-year growth plan, turnover is forecast to increase from an expected £35m this year to £250m by 2026 while staff numbers will grow five-fold from 200 to 1,000.

Marc, 54, took over as MD from his father, John, in 1999.

At that time the company employed 20 people and had an annual turnover of £1m.

Fellow Board members are brothers Neil, Salvage Director, pictured left, and Jonathan, Sales Director, pictured right.

The six potential new sites planned by Trent will be close to main population centres in areas such as the North, Midlands and London and the South East.

They’ll include both distribution centres and recycling sites.

Marc said: “I’m extremely proud at how far we’ve come and what we’re now achieving.

“We’re part of a £6bn sector.

“There are 36 million cars in the UK, 2m are scrapped each year.

“Our new distribution centre, and plans for the next five years, put us in the best possible position to drive growth for the future.”

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