English - Nooteboom Giants on the Road Magazine English - Nr. 3 - 2016 | Page 14
GIANTS ON THE ROAD
THE FIRST BANKRUPTCY OF YUMBO
TAKEOVER
“Yumbo went bankrupt and we lost the main part of our turnover. We
were saved by International Harvester. This American company took
over Yumbo and decided to expand the production and to increase the
number of models. The factories were operating at full capacity again and
the demand for transport kept pace. The HGVs were getting stronger and
heavier. It was in those days that for the first time we had a combination
of a 6x4 tractor and a low-loader with a combined weight of 80 tonnes.”
“Together with my wife Francoise I took over the transport company
from my father in 1983. Our customers were suppliers of large machinery and large contractors. Caterpillar, Volvo, Hitachi, Potain and PPM use
us to transport part of their products. At the same time we acquired an
increasing number of customers from various industrial sectors and for
the transport of steel structures. In 2014 it was time to make way for the
next generation. My daughter Catherine is general manager and together
with my other daughter Sylvie she now owns Transports Chervier.”
DISASTROUS YEAR
“De two main customers of Chervier were Richier and International
Harvester, the producer of Yumbo. Both companies went bankrupt in
1978. In order to survive we had to reduce our workforce from twenty-five employees to ten. Owing to our good reputation and, above all,
our experienced drivers we continued to transport large machinery for
other customers. We then began to invest rapidly in new trucks and
semi-trailers.”
CHERVIER AND NOOTEBOOM
“We are very loyal to our suppliers. Prior to 1996 most of our semi-trailers were supplied by Kaiser. Due to various technical problems we
bought the first Nooteboom low-loader in 1996, a 3-axle Euro low-loader
with a Jeepdolly. This combination was already trend-setting at that time.
This Jeepdolly consisted of one extra axle behind the tractor, for more
payload and better load distribution.
French legislation requires
a very precise distribution
of the load over the axles
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