How Yorkshire firm Pelican Engineering has been keeping it in the family for 103 years

While as a schoolboy, eagerly visiting his father at work the idea of him eventually becoming part of the family business was already on the cards, neither of them could have foreseen how the changing world would alter their business in future decades.

He could never have predicted that when, in 2012, he agreed for Pelican to be a distributor for Chinese manufacturing company Yutong, electric buses, already proving popular in China, would become a major market in the UK.

Richard, managing director of Castleford-based Pelican Engineering, explains that he has fond memories of starting to learn the family trade from his father as a boy.

“I remember when, as a young child in my school pants, I’d see my father in the yard at work,” he says.

"He’d be very busy but would always have time for me to visit.

"He’d stand there and say ‘have a good look around son, because one day all this will be yours.’

"I suppose the business was programmed into me at a very young age.”

Pelican was founded in 1919 by Richard’s grandfather Ernest Crump, a motorcycle despatch rider in the First World War.

Having left the army with his despatch pay, Ernest started buying petrol driven army lorries and converting them for civilian use by fitting diesel engines in them.

The business developed over the years, and eventually became a distributor for Foden trucks, with a single site in Rothwell, Leeds.

Ernest ran the business until he passed away in 1968 when Richard’s father Bob took the driving seat.

Having originally joined the family firm as a mechanic after studying Mechanical Engineering at Leeds University, Richard became managing director in 1996 and change was soon on the cards as he explains.

“As a single site, we needed to move forwards,” he reflects.

"Really, if you stand still, you go backwards.

"My father never really wanted to do anything other than keep the thing going and not risk or change anything.

“Shortly after I took over, we built new premises in Castleford at Wakefield Europort and changed from being a Foden dealer to a DAF truck dealer.

"DAF is currently the market-leading brand in the UK.

“We built on that DAF dealership and in 2008 we built a separate building for our MAN business (part of the Volkswagen Group).”

By 2012, Richard was ready to grow the business further.

After discussions with a Turkish manufacturer ended when that company went into liquidation, Richard turned his eyes to the Chinese market.

He remembers: “I noticed that someone else was importing Chinese trucks and I thought there wasn’t much room for Chinese trucks in the market, but what about Chinese coaches?

“One of my colleagues in his previous employment had been to a Chinese company called Yutong which is the largest manufacturer of buses and coaches in the world.

"We went over to China to talk to them, and they were very keen on looking at new overseas markets.

“Six months later we signed up and the first coaches arrived.

“At the time we thought it would be a handy ‘add on’ to the business selling 25 or 30 coaches hopefully at a higher margin than we could do the equivalent number of trucks to make the lower volume worthwhile.”

But little did Richard know how much the business would grow and become a central part of their operations.

He says: “As luck would have it Yutong, as much as they’re the largest overall bus and coach manufacturer, they’re by far the largest manufacturer of electric buses and coaches as well.

“We gained enormous traction, and I had people coming to me and saying ‘Gosh, you must have incredible foresight going over to China in 2012 and now having these electric buses’.

“But I have to say it’s not the case whatsoever – it’s been pure good luck!

“In 2012 there was no way I could connect the words electric and bus together.”

He continues: “In the last three years we’ve had an absolute boom in electric buses and we’re hoping that this year we should deliver around 250.

"We’re not the largest supplier in the UK but this year at least I think we’re the second largest.

“Our bus business is now about two thirds of our total business.

"This year we turned over £67million and our business is approximately two thirds of that.

“The technology for a double decker bus is more complicated than for a single decker because the vehicle naturally weighs more, and the batteries are quite hefty items compared to a small six-litre engine.

“We’ve cracked this issue and got an electric double decker coming for custom delivery in Quarter 2 next year and that alone should let us grow the business further.”

Richard reflects on the family ties with the business, which are already continuing into the next generation through his daughter’s involvement.

He says: “We’re all extremely proud that we’ve managed to keep the business within the family.

"My daughter, Amelia, has just changed thoughts of a career in the fashion industry to join the company and is doing well.

"She started in administration but recently moved into coach sales.

"We set her a target of 12 sales and has already done ten!

“And even my dad, at the great age of 92, still visits a couple of times a week and shows a great interest in everything we’re doing.”