City Link Ltd.

City Link

Type	Subsidiary
Industry	Courier
Founded	1969
Headquarters	Coventry, England, UK
Key people	David Smith (Managing Director) Robert Peto (Finance Director)
Products	Freight Forwarding Services Logistics Services
Revenue	£335.5 million GBP (2010)
Owner(s)	Rentokil Initial
Website	http://www.city-link.co.uk

City Link is a British next day courier company based in Coventry, United Kingdom. City Link operates services in the UK including the Isle of Man from its hub in Coventry in the West Midlands although functional offices exist in other areas of the country. The company is part of Rentokil Initial plc.

History

City Link was founded in 1969 (as a subsidiary of Orbit Cargo Services Limited) and was the brain-child of two London minicab drivers, Harry Hammond-Seaman and Jo Burt^{[citation needed]}. The company was created to provide a cross-town transfer service for Red Star Parcels (operated by British Rail) and initially operated from an old fish & chip shop at 67 Chalton Street, London, NW1 in the middle of a street market.^{[citation needed]} At the time, Red Star Parcels only travelled on direct passenger services, so a sender in Brighton could not despatch a parcel to Norwich, as a transfer had to be undertaken in London between London Victoria station and Liverpool Street station. In addition, the Red Star service was limited to station-to-station only and following increasing demand from its customers, City Link established a UK nationwide network of "Agents" to collect parcels from the local station and deliver to the consignee.

In 1971, Robert J. (Bob) Thomas purchased a controlling interest in the company which had a turnover of approximately £100,000 ($150,000)per annum.^{[citation needed]}In the early 1970s City Link franchised the service, the first to do so in the industry. Most of the "Agents" were local taxi services and many were later to become City Link franchisees.^{[citation needed]} The "flying C" logo was created by Johnson Hollands Publicity in 1971 where the "C" depicted half the front of a steam locomotive and the wings represented speed.^{[citation needed]}

In 1989 the company was acquired by Securiguard Limited. Bob Thomas resigned in 1991 having grown the business at a compound rate of 30 plus per cent per annum to achieve revenues in excess of £32 million ($48 million) per year.^{[citation needed]} In 1993 Rentokil group purchased Securiguard.^{[citation needed]} In 1997 the name was changed from City Link to Initial City Link, following the takeover of BET, which owned the strong Initial brand in the UK.^{[citation needed]} On 20 November 2005 Initial City Link announced that as a part of its expansion programme, they were to ‘buy back’ the franchises.^[1] This was completed in March 2007 with the purchase of Tiger Haulage Ltd, City Link's Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire and Buckinghamshire franchise. At the time of purchase, Tiger Haulage was the largest franchisee of Initial City Link, operating 30 depots over 4 counties. In late 2006 City Link's head office moved from Sunbury on Thames to Camberley in Surrey, and in 2011 moved again to Coventry in West Midlands.^{[citation needed]} The company reverted to its original name in 2006 – City Link.

Target Express acquisition

Exactly one year after Initial City Link announced its buy back scheme, Initial City Link finished negotiations with the shareholders of Target Express to purchase the company on 20 November 2006.^[2] Target was officially acquired and taken over by Initial City Link on 1 March 2007. As a part of its merger with Target Express, City Link was planning to close 42 of the 110 combined branches in the first half of 2008 to provide a single integrated network. However at the end of February 2008 managing director Petar Cvetkovic announced a suspension of further integration of Target Express depots until January 2009. The merger of the two units has proved problematic (particularly due to depots running different computer systems),^[3] damaging profits at parent company Rentokil Initial.^[4] Rentokil turned down several offers for the loss-making unit in 2008, stating that it instead intended to turn around City Link's fortunes.^[5]

References

1. ^ "Rentokil Initial profit deterioration slows". AFX News (Forbes). 3 November 2005. http://www.forbes.com/markets/feeds/afx/2005/11/03/afx2315680.html. Retrieved 2008-07-29. 
2. ^ "Rentokil to buy Target Express for 210 mln stg; to sell electronic security ops". AFX News (Forbes). 30 November 2006. http://www.forbes.com/business/feeds/afx/2006/11/30/afx3215280.html. Retrieved 2008-07-29. 
3. ^ Osborne, Alistair (23 April 2008). "Rentokil chief delivers City Link blow". The Daily Telegraph. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2008/04/22/cnrent122.xml. Retrieved 2008-07-29. 
4. ^ "City Link to hit Rentokil profits". BBC News. 28 February 2008. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7268354.stm. Retrieved 2008-07-29. 
5. ^ Stiff, Peter; Robertson, David (3 May 2008). "Rentokil plans to hold on to City Link". The Times (London). http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/support_services/article3864243.ece. Retrieved 2008-07-29. 

External links

• Official website