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West Coast Motors acquire Perryman's of Berwick

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DunsBus

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http://www.westcoastmotors.co.uk/about-us/

West Coast Motors acquires Berwick-upon-Tweed based bus company

West Coast Motors is delighted to announce the acquisition of Perryman’s Buses Ltd of Berwick-Upon-Tweed.
Perryman’s is an award-winning family business owned by Richard and Linda Perryman which operates a range of commercial and supported bus services in the Scottish Borders and Northumberland areas as well as offering private hire services and seasonal coach tours. It employs approx 75 staff and operates a fleet of 45 buses and coaches and has depots based in Berwick Upon Tweed and St. Boswells.

Commenting on the acquisition, Colin Craig, Managing Director of West Coast Motors says:
“Perryman’s Buses is a successful and very well-run business thanks to the efforts of Richard, Linda and their son Roddy and we will ensure that it is very much business as usual for all Perryman’s customers, both in terms of the local community and organisations such as Scottish Borders Council and Northumberland Council.

It is very much our aim to continue the good work undertaken previously as well as to build on this with further investment in fleet and customer focused systems in the coming years. We believe that our experience and synergies with our other businesses will bring long-term benefits to Perryman’s and its customers as we develop and expand our range of services in the south and east of Scotland and north of England.

We very much look forward to working with the existing team at Perryman’s as well as meeting with customers, local businesses and organisations in the coming months”.

Commenting on the sale of the business, Richard Perryman says,
"After 44 years in business I am immensely proud of what our family has achieved, I am confident the business will be in great hands under the ownership of Colin. West Coast Motors are one of the most respected independent Operators in UK with great coaching heritage and share many similarities with our operation.
Linda and I would like to thank our many customers and extend a special thank you to our staff for the support they have given us over many years, it's very much business as usual with our son Roddy and his superb local teams continuing the story during this exciting new chapter in the history of the company".

The news has taken quite a few folk by surprise, although I'm aware that the Perrymans had had an eye on retirement for some time.

Interesting times ahead...
 
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GaryMcEwan

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An acquisition that doesn't involve McGills?!? Good see to a quality operator taking over the company. Plus Perryman's have got quite a decent fleet list as well, so WCM shouldn't need to invest to heavily for new vehicles.
 

overthewater

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That is good. Just to ask does anyone actually know where the old Berwick's shared bus depot & bus station was?
 

TheGrandWazoo

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That is good. Just to ask does anyone actually know where the old Berwick's shared bus depot & bus station was?

Easy one that. Just come over the main bridge and into Golden Square. Bus station was virtually bang in front at the mini roundabout, to the right of the Berwick Advertiser offices. It was basically a "lollipop" with a slope up (drop off) and then widened out where the depot was, buses turning round and then facing down to pick up.

If you go round the back to Chapel Street, you have the library building which is where the depot was. Walk through the car park and what was the back of Woolworths (now Home Bargains) and you can see some rusted marks on the wall which is where the brackets for shelters were attached.

Bus depot relocated initially to the MOT testing station on Tweedmouth Industrial Estate before moving to the former Furst (not First!!) car showroom at Scremerston. Both shared between First/Lowland and Arriva/NMS.

DunsBus (Steven) will know much more than me!!
 

overthewater

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Ah so did spot it then without releasing it, I was in the town have a good look around, just couldn't see anything. I'm still surprised Arriva operates up to Berwick from Alnwick.

Plenty of scoup for expansion in the area.
 

TheGrandWazoo

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Ah so did spot it then without releasing it, I was in the town have a good look around, just couldn't see anything. I'm still surprised Arriva operates up to Berwick from Alnwick.

Plenty of scoup for expansion in the area.

I don't know really. A lot of the work there is subsidised, whether that be to Wooler or elsewhere. Not much else to go for. Arriva sold their operations in Berwick as they couldn't make them pay but Perrymans have done well. The town services are now much less frequent though how that compares to pre-dereg, I can't recall but perhaps they've just got it about right.

As for Arriva's current operations, they were run from Alnwick and a lot of the drivers transferred there from Berwick when it closed - some old fashioned staff loyalty! When that depot closed, the operations were run from Ashington but that caused all manner of problems so they now have an outbase in Alnwick. Traffic is a bit thin at this time of year but gets busy in the summer and Arriva have upped the frequency to hourly from two hourly in the days when they had a depot in Berwick. Also, the rolling stock is a bit better now too.

DunsBus will have chapter and verse on the Berwick bus scene :D
 

Robertj21a

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Ah so did spot it then without releasing it, I was in the town have a good look around, just couldn't see anything. I'm still surprised Arriva operates up to Berwick from Alnwick.

Plenty of scoup for expansion in the area.

Well they operate up to Berwick from Newcastle, it's only the drivers who, mostly, come from Alnwick.
 

robertclark125

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Perrymans cut the town frequencies in Berwick when they bought the routes from Arriva, I have to say, the current network of town routes is a little confusing, but maybe WCM could create a simplified network.

Be also interesting to see how they develop the 253 (Berwick - Edinburgh).
 
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