I’m posting this in both the main forum and the Old Time, so if you’ve replied on one feel free to ignore the other! It’s the first of two posts looking for some people with quite specific experience for a couple of features I’m putting together for T&D. This is the more urgent of the two, hence it coming first!
I’m looking for drivers who were around just as RDCs started to become a thing, and in their early days, for a historical piece. Were you on shop deliveries when it was all still taken direct from supplier to seller? Were you someone who remembers that kind of work first starting to change? Or were you new to the game at the same time as these places were starting to kick off? Past research tell me we’re looking at the late 80s/early 90s time period, but I may be way off…
If any of the above, or any other permutation of the above, applies to you, would you be up for giving me 20 minutes of your time for a quick phone interview please? If so, reply below and I’ll drop you a PM.
Possibly the best known among contributors was Safeway Aylesford which was the company HQ as well. Safeway ran a large fleet of Atkinsons and Scammell Handymen. This was one of the first RDCs in the country AFAIK.
Things were definitely different back then, you wouldn’t get forklifts driving onto the back of a flat platform to unload these days, but that was how it was done at Westbury. IIRC Sainsbury’s Hoddesdon was unloaded from the side. There were sories about the place back in the ealry '70s about being banned from the site if the lorry leaked oil onot the ground… which most did in copious amounts anyway.
Keymarkets at Brandon would normally take a lorry a day from Mack and Edwards who were a big name in the fruit and veg markets as well as a packhouse for foreign fruit.
Burgess Hill was the site of a Mackfisheries RDC which also took in a lorry a day or more from Mack and Edwards.
There was another RDC at Colwall but I cannot recall the company.
What would today be considered as supermarket RDCs were certainly around in the mid-1970s. I delivered to Tesco at Winsford then and what was Hilliers (I think) at Bradford, which is now Morrison’s. Old RDCs are Sainsbury’s Charlton (now known as Riverside), and Sainsbury’s Basingstoke. Pre-dating RDCs were the warehouses of provision merchants, who ran their own fleets of delivery vehicles to individual shops. Not forgetting of course the massive Unilever distribution company, SPD, which also did third party distribution. Fresh produce was delivered to wholesale markets, every sizable town had one, cities had more than one. From there the fruit and veg merchant delivered to green grocers’ shops, factory canteens, school kitchens, and hospitals on their own vehicles. Many greengrocers went to market every morning to buy their fruit and veg for the day. Ditto florists buying flowers. What needs to be considered for such an article Lucy is how shopping and retailing patterns have been changed by supermarkets. Dry grocery shops did not sell fresh fruit and veg, they did not even sell fresh milk. That was the province of the milkman Very few foodstuffs were delivered directly from factory to shop, only bread and other bakery products.
cav551:
Possibly the best known among contributors was Safeway Aylesford which was the company HQ as well. Safeway ran a large fleet of Atkinsons and Scammell Handymen. This was one of the first RDCs in the country AFAIK.
Things were definitely different back then, you wouldn’t get forklifts driving onto the back of a flat platform to unload these days, but that was how it was done at Westbury. IIRC Sainsbury’s Hoddesdon was unloaded from the side. There were sories about the place back in the ealry '70s about being banned from the site if the lorry leaked oil onot the ground… which most did in copious amounts anyway.
Keymarkets at Brandon would normally take a lorry a day from Mack and Edwards who were a big name in the fruit and veg markets as well as a packhouse for foreign fruit.
Burgess Hill was the site of a Mackfisheries RDC which also took in a lorry a day or more from Mack and Edwards.
There was another RDC at Colwall but I cannot recall the company.
Colwall was Tesco, later moved to Cheptow, used to deliver to Tesco at Colwall, Hainault, and Romsey all small depots at the time pre Harlow, Didcot, Rainham later Snodland, Chepstow, Didcot Middleton most of these futuristic RDC’s have also now gone but certainly delivered on a daily basis with fresh fruit for Sainsbury, Tesco, Asda, Waitrose, Co-op and ■■■ between 80 and 98!
In the late 60’s i worked for a potatoe packing firm and a meat canning firm and didn’t deliver to any RDC’s but right to the corner shop or supermarket. Maybe it’s because i drove a four wheel rigid and not a trailer load but even going to a Tesco supermarket with a full load i didn’t have an appointment to deliver, sometimes had to wait for another wagon to finish but it was pretty much first come first served where i went. Don’t ever remember any of the receiving people being a PITA, it was usually just one bloke and he usually helped unload so he could check the merchandise in. I did deliver to some warehouse’s but not like the big mega ones they have now with all the rules and regulations and didn’t have an appointment at them but even so things seem to run pretty smoothly but like i said, they weren’t mega RDC’s with hundreds of bays.
I think you mean Hillards gingerfold, they had a place at Gomersal I think. I remember trying to deliver to Cash and Carrys in the’70s - 4 to 6 hours taken regularly.
Multiple Fruit Supplies Ltd,part of Glass Glover Distribution ran a warehouse/RDC on behalf of Littlewoods Stores Group from 1974 onwards at Maltby Sth Yorks. They also had sub depots for transhipment at Ross on Wye,Altrincham,Hitchin and Newbridge Edinburgh as well as outbased drivers at Penrith,Newcastle,Perth,Basingstoke,Birkenhead and Sleaford.
Chris Webb:
Multiple Fruit Supplies Ltd,part of Glass Glover Distribution ran a warehouse/RDC on behalf of Littlewoods Stores Group from 1974 onwards at Maltby Sth Yorks. They also had sub depots for transhipment at Ross on Wye,Altrincham,Hitchin and Newbridge Edinburgh as well as outbased drivers at Penrith,Newcastle,Perth,Basingstoke,Birkenhead and Sleaford.
I thought they had a depot near Reading (on the old Woodley aerodrome perhaps?) Chris as we serviced their BMC Lairds/Boxers in Reading and I don’t think they came up from Basingstoke?
Chris Webb:
Multiple Fruit Supplies Ltd,part of Glass Glover Distribution ran a warehouse/RDC on behalf of Littlewoods Stores Group from 1974 onwards at Maltby Sth Yorks. They also had sub depots for transhipment at Ross on Wye,Altrincham,Hitchin and Newbridge Edinburgh as well as outbased drivers at Penrith,Newcastle,Perth,Basingstoke,Birkenhead and Sleaford.
I thought they had a depot near Reading (on the old Woodley aerodrome perhaps?) Chris as we serviced their BMC Lairds/Boxers in Reading and I don’t think they came up from Basingstoke?
Pete.
Before I started with them in late 1978 they used to do a Woodley trunk Pete,the Basingstoke outbased driver started around mid 80s.He ran up to Oxford for midnight and we changed over with him from Maltby.He delivered Portsmouth and Basingstoke via security keys,most of Littlewoods deliveries were done on the key,overnight.
worked for Thomas bell [ BE-RO flour] 1962-66, ranks took this company over about 1963-64 that’s when things changed from own depot deliveries to the start of what’s now known as rdc centre .
joshua wilson durham fine fare gateshead and east kilbride where some of the place’s we delivered to, bumper
Petjamrut:
Colwall was Tesco, later moved to Cheptow, used to deliver to Tesco at Colwall, Hainault, and Romsey all small depots at the time pre Harlow, Didcot, Rainham later Snodland, Chepstow, Didcot Middleton most of these futuristic RDC’s have also now gone but certainly delivered on a daily basis with fresh fruit for Sainsbury, Tesco, Asda, Waitrose, Co-op and ■■■ between 80 and 98!
Thanks for clearing that up and reminding me of Hainault. This now reminds me of one of the local ones I had forgotten - Pricerite Swanley.
I did a couple of loads from Burtons biscuits in Edinburgh down to B.O.C. Transhield in Faversham around 1974 ish. I don’t think the word R.D.C. was very popular then, it was just another large warehouse with a long queue.
Petjamrut:
Colwall was Tesco, later moved to Cheptow, used to deliver to Tesco at Colwall, Hainault, and Romsey all small depots at the time pre Harlow, Didcot, Rainham later Snodland, Chepstow, Didcot Middleton most of these futuristic RDC’s have also now gone but certainly delivered on a daily basis with fresh fruit for Sainsbury, Tesco, Asda, Waitrose, Co-op and ■■■ between 80 and 98!
Thanks for clearing that up and reminding me of Hainault. This now reminds me of one of the local ones I had forgotten - Pricerite Swanley.
Used to deliver to most places named but one that stands out for me was Romsey. Delivered 10 ton of oranges and grapefruit midnight sometime in 69. It was my very first load/job as a lorry driver.
There’s an article about Sainsbury’s RDCs in the Atkinson factory magazine in the late 60s - I think it refers to Hoddesdon, Basingstoke and Charlton, with the lorries in focus being based at Hoddesdon
Presto was another supermarket chain,taken over by Safeway late 80s.
Glass Glover Distribution took the f and v contract for the south east in 1987,based at Pump Lane Hayes.The deliveries were done overnight,just left outside the shops or round the backs if possible and not secured. I went there twice shunting and office work from Maltby and on my last shift there we were short of a driver for one drop Bognor Regis.I took it misen at 2200 hrs,found the yard,backed in and tipped 36 cages of produce in the dark whilst the shelf stackers watched out of an upstairs window,idle t*ats.
So the last cage was shoved off the tail lift at a height,showering their bloody yard with pre packed spuds,and I was away without picking any empties up as they had not been broken down.
Got back to Hayes,only to get a bollocking off the TM for going down the road,so I suggested that I should have rung him to take the load and then told him I’d finished at Hayes and was going back to Maltby as requested by our TM there; it was running up to Xmas and my services were required.
I think the change came to the old style RDC such as Sainsbury, Basingstoke, with the introduction of bar-codes and turned them into the nightmares that they are today.
