Moving in right direction

Britannia Movers International vans" class="imageframe alignright" height="130" src="http://www.shropshirestar.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/11/brit.jpg" width="175"/>It is a case of Rule Britannia for a company on the Shropshire/Wales border that is definitely moving in the right direction.

Removal firm Thomas Casserly's, of Chirk, near Oswestry, has joined Britannia Movers International Plc.

It is a prestigious achievement for the upwardly mobile company, and follows a lengthy and exhaustive qualifying process.

As the UK's largest independent moving group, Britannia has helped tens of thousands of people move home throughout the UK and overseas for 25 years.

It provides a tremendous support network for its members, which is why it is so difficult to get into. It is quite a rigorous application process.

"They visit you to see whether you are big enough and ambitious enough for them, as well as having the right financial status. You have to buy shares and show, as a company, that you can bring something to the party," said Thomas Casserly's managing director, Martin Thomas.

All Britannia members are family-owned-and-run companies. They have the backing from more than 50 locations throughout the UK, with a combined fleet of more than 400 well-equipped vehicles and over 1,000 highly-trained and experienced staff.

"Members work among themselves and help one another. For instance, on a job coming from Scotland to Shropshire, we might provide the manpower at this end.

"We are still individual companies but working under the Britannia umbrella. It gives us a great support network. Britannia has a head office with massive purchasing power and marketing capability.

"It offers a great deal to a family company which is trying to grow. It gives us a good identity," added Martin, who said his company had undergone extensive rebranding to incorporate the Britannia image including a new look to its fleet of five large vehicles.

Joining Britannia will, for instance, help Thomas Casserly's cope with the troughs in the housing market which bring an inevitable slowdown in the numbers of movers, with the downturn particularly noticeable during the winter.

"Britannia are renowned for shipping and it means there is the opportunity for us to do a lot of international work," said Martin.

"It can be tough in the removal business if all you do is domestic removals. You have to be involved in other things."

To that end the company is establishing itself as a European and deep sea shipping specialist, with a depot in Malaga to handle all southern Spain traffic.

Britannia Thomas Casserly's is particularly renowned for its document storage and confidential destruction service. It has a warehouse containing around 15,000 boxes of documents, all cross-indexed by computer so that a particular file can be located in seconds.

It has a containerised and self-storage facility for other types of items.

And, of course, it offers a domestic and commercial removals service throughout the UK.

The company was formed out of two old established family companies eight years ago.

Thomas' was founded by Martin's grandfather in the 1920s in Wrexham. It expanded into Shropshire in 1999 when it acquired one of Shrewsbury's oldest removal companies, A Casserly & Son, which had been established in 1913.

The company moved to its current site, a purpose-built 10,000 sq ft base on the Gledrid Business Park, four years ago, where it has a workforce of nearly 20.

The future is certainly looking bright for Britannia Thomas Casserly's and Martin is confident there will be a thriving family business to one day hand over to his four-year-old twin boys.