Distributorship photos on Flickr

Chris Kelly, founder, in July 1987 by Keltruck Scania

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TRUCK September 1987

THE TRUCK INTERVIEW

Some say Chris Kelly's pace is too hot to handle. He has built one of Scania's biggest-selling dealers in just four years, and now plans to turn his carefully chosen Midlands site into the UK's first truck parts supermarket. A transport entrepreneur of the '80s, he is professional, innovative and shrewd. He is also one of the best-known and best liked dealers in his area. Jack Semple went to meet him

CHRIS KELLY IS THE SORT OF person who can put the Black Country back on the industrial map. Well-liked and respected, shrewd, hard working and acutely aware of money, he has come from relative obscurity to be one of the most successful truck dealers of the '80s. He aims to be on the Unlisted Securities Market before the end of the decade.

He only got his Scania franchise for the West Midlands in '83, but the business grew so fast that by '86 he had almost the biggest Scania distributorship in Britain, second only to the combined sales of the Scantruck dealer outlets in Purfleet and Heathrow, which are owned by the manufacturer. In the calendar year, Keltruck delivered 385 units.

Scania has reason to be thankful for Kelly's success. Not only has he moved a lot of metal, in stark contrast to his predecessor, but he has bolstered the Scania back-up network in his area, which has the busiest motorway stretches in Europe.

His plan is to develop Keltruck still further to make it an industry showpiece for the '90s. At the same time, the Kelly Group has diversified into other aspects of the industry, including contract haulage, and a clearing house, reversing the common pattern for hauliers to take on heavy truck outlets.

As Keltruck has grown, especially in the past year, it has changed, perhaps by necessity. and several members of staff and some fitters have left. Chris Kelly didn't seek to play down the changes when we spoke to him last month.

It could all have been a bit different if Lloyds of Ludlow, a well-known Welsh border haulier, hadn't been given the Daf outlet in the West Midlands in preference to Chris Kelly. At that stage, his secondhand truck business had not long developed from being just a one-man band.

Chris Kelly already had a firm grounding in trucks. He left school at 15 for an apprenticeship at Atwoods, which in the '60s was well-known for selling high-class cars, but also Bedford trucks. After five years in the workshop he moved across into service reception instead. 'I quite liked that. It was a means of leaving the shop floor.'

Ryland Group, which he joined in the early '70s, gave him a strong background in dealer management, first at Oldhill Motors, a Seddon dealer, then at head office, where he was given a job in administration by director Gordon Cox. 'They had an excellent group of people,' he said. The group was progressive. and gave good training in discipline and management control systems. 'Ryland was very much the exception.'

In '75, he branched out on his own, selling used trucks from an office lent by a local haulier, and using a corporation car park to keep the trucks. The business became better known when he moved to Neachells Lane, a popular road for trucks delivering to steel foundries and stockholders, where he could hardly fail to be noticed. 'I had an aptitude and ability to seek out secondhand trucks,' he said.

In those days, many of the trucks were Dafs, including 20 on hire operations, and he applied, unsuccessfully, for a Daf distributorship. In '80, he moved to a bigger, five acre site at Wolverhampton. Then the recession hit.

'It was just as if somebody had cut the telephone wires. Interest rates shot up from 12percent to 18percent, very, very quickly.' I had £400,000 of stock, which today would be worth £1.5 million. A late truck then would cost £10,000. Now, it costs up to £30.000.'

Chris Kelly developed a contract hire business in the early '80s, partly as a tax mitigation, and partly to develop a second, peripheral business. He had been making steady progress in building the business and profit, but it was almost entirely dependent on him being available all the time. Apart from himself, there was only a part-time office girl and a driver. 'I was off sick for three weeks and the place virtually ground to a standstill.'

By '82, he was buying Scanias for contract hire, and rental, and retailing a lot of used Scanias. In '82, the manufacturer, looking to replace its West Midlands dealer, called. At the time, Kelly also had around 100 trailers on hire. But he decided to take the plunge with Scania.

To raise funds. he auctioned off most of his trucks and all the trailers. A recession-hit local haulier, J & S Hemmings, which had a history going back to the horse and cart days, was also wanting to sell up, and the two combined their fleets into a single auction, handled by CMA from Leeds. Almost the whole lot was sold off.

Keltruck was the first new name on the Scania franchise network to replace a dealer (although Scania had bought out Scantruck), but Kelly was determined to break the mould in other ways, too. Many truck distributors had been sited up back streets, miles away from industrialised areas. 'I thought the right and logical place was next to the largest population and concentration of industrial manufacturing, and if possible couple this with a motorway.'

In fact Kelly's site, the old Corona typewriter works in West Bromwich, lies next to the M5, just short of the intersection with the M6. He got it at an ideal time, when industry in the Black Country was at a low level.

Being next to a motorway is not unique, and several dealers have moved to such sites in recent years. But you can't miss Keltruck from the M5. ‘Talk to truck drivers and ask them to name a distributor they know in the Midlands, and they're likely to say Keltruck. That to me has got to be a good thing.'

While Keltruck looks well positioned from the outside, internal management holds the key to success, he said. A lot of dealerships have gone under 'through lack of control systems within the business and lack of management awareness.'

He believes in paying high salaries. 'It's a very, very tough business, and you've got to have very good people.' Low salaries increasingly are a thing of the past now, he said.

Kelly has been almost as valuable to Scania as the maker has been to him. His tidy office is mirrored in the workshop and the yard

That's not to say they don't work for their money. Kelly is an entrepreneur who gives it all he's got, and he demands a lot from his staff. And he stated that he is not the sort of managing director of a company who allows a man to stay in a job if he's not performing as required.

Kelly said he'd had to learn how to run a bigger company. 'I've had to learn how to delegate and set guidelines and parameters to competent people.' He's been to three management courses at Ashridge College, arranged by Scania for dealer principles, and found them valuable. 'I wouldn't spend two-and-a-half days there if it was just a social gathering.’

Within the company, Kelly has used the Industrial Society in recent months as part of a programme aimed at building a management team. The IS was recommended by Kelly's brother-in-law, who is company secretary with a large group. Late last year he had the whole management team, including wives and children, at a weekend course organised by the IS, at a big West Midlands hotel. 'It gave the wives more of an appreciation of the hours people have to work in this industry.

'Operators of trucks are getting more and more demanding. Just like Arthur Scargill is trying to fend off six-day rota working, we have to work over seven days.' Management rotas have to take account of that, he said. (Keltruck has five breakdown vans, and a parts back-up stock which is highly regarded among Scania users in the Midlands.)

Kelly explained the IS involvement: 'It's just like building a football team. And we're trying to counter poaching.' At the moment there's a situation in the business of 'all change' when the whistle blows', Kelly said. 'The truck industry has failed to train younger people from within. We're looking for university graduates in business management or engineering to join us as management trainees.'

When Kelly takes his company onto the USM. he'll be offering employees shares in the enterprise. 'Share participation has been a great success for the NFC. I hope to do something similar, in a much smaller way.'

The team does not look the same as it did last year, as at least three managers have left the group, to join or set up a new company. Without being drawn on individual cases, Kelly acknowledges the departures. The changes are a consequence of moving from a smaller company to a larger firm. he said.

In the workshop it is no longer possible for customers simply to wander in and chat to individual fitters, which some customers had been used to, but which is impracticable in a large workshop. Tools tend to go ·missing, too, he added.

Kelly has adopted much of the current thinking on fitters. Not all are realistically able to be trained to do every job on a truck, and that should be recognised, he said. Changes in the workshop are aimed at making it more efficient. It's more formal, certainly, but should also prove more flexible and reliable for the truck operator.

The belt and braces approach is now clearly out at Keltruck, if it was ever in. Kelly wages war on clutter, and demands clarity at all times. In the workshop he has three men employed solely to keep the place clean and tidy. Trucks parked at the dealership ready to go out to customers are parked in immaculate rows, on Kelly's insistence.

But it is his office which most clearly shows the Chris Kelly style. Sited at an extreme corner of the main building, the room housed the water storage tank in the days when the place was a typewriter factory with a sprinkler system to put out fires.

When you go in, you can't see a desk. His work station is behind a partition, and is a fairly narrow shelf which of necessity prevents a build -up of paperwork. 'This way I can keep my own bits and pieces out of sight, and no-one can see the clutter. (By any normal standards, there is none.)

'In this trade there's a lot of good upside-down readers', he quipped. If anyone comes in to see him, they meet over a businesslike table, although there are leather armchairs, too.

Some trucks were ready for August 1 registration, but not as many as last year, as supply fell frustratingly behind demand

A couple of impressionist prints by Lavery are on the wall. They're Roger Stevens' taste,' (group marketing manager) he said.

Kelly plans to· put in similar work stations for his managers. 'It's the trend at the minute, but I think it's very good.' It gives people peace to concentrate on the job, he said.

Kelly's next development at West Bromwich will be a major redevelopment of the site, which will bring the supermarket concept to the UK truck industry, by the end of '88. There will be a complete range of t ruck maintenance and repair services on site, with facilities for drivers collecting, delivering, or waiting for a truck.

But most innovative of all, will be a parts 'supermarket', where customers will literally be able to pick parts off shelves. Keltruck aims not only to have a full Scania range, but trailer parts, and other components and accessories. He won't be following the Multipart line, though, and offering parts for Scania's competitor marques.

'There are quite a few places like that in the States, but there are only two or three in Europe, and there are none in Britain.'

Before that, Keltruck will open an out let in Stoke-on-Trent, to compete with other heavy truck dealers in the area. The site will be open by the end of the year, he said.

The Ashridge courses help to give a vision of where the industry is going, and where a dealer's business can fit in to it, Kelly said. He'll take the group onto the USM to enjoy the benefits he's worked for, and to raise cash to expand the business both internally and through acquisition.

So Kelly will be keeping an eye out for business opportunities associated with trucks. Tm not into property.' Business development has already taken him back into contract haulage, which he said has been a natural progression from truck contract hire, and which in turn was developed from truck retailing.

He has bought several haulage firms, in one case to turn round a traditional general haulage operation running older lorries to a new, streamlined firm, working on contract.

'I like the word contract,' he said, 'it's got some future to it. It means the work isn't here today, gone tomorrow.

'The traditional market for purchasing of trucks is declining substantially,' he said. Operators are increasingly looking for fixed prices. A new breed of businessman is coming into haulage, and looking carefully at the cost of use of trucks.

Trucks in future will be used more intensively than they have been, and they'll be cut up earlier, to avoid expensive breakdowns. Kelly has changed his views on extensive rebuilding of trucks, which has been given a boost by tax changes. The practice is common in the States, under the 'glider kit' system.

'I now believe that people haven't got the time,' he said. But it could vary from one part of the country to another. There's a lot of truck expertise available in Yorkshire and Lancashire at reasonable cost, for example.

'There's never been a better time to buy new and trade-in than now,' he said, adding: 'We're the best buyers for a clean used Scania.'

Kelly's biggest problem this year has been a shortage of trucks to sell, both second-hand and new. 'We're sold through now until September production,' he winced, talking to us in early July.

One area Kelly is not at all keen to attack again is spot rental of trailers. They're too much trouble. There's too much potential accident damage, unless they're on contract hire. And the trailers can go through a £1400 set of tyres in anything from six months to 12 months.' Also, tri-axle trailers rip off tyres much more than on tandem trailers.

While Chris Kelly is widely known to have a good nose for business, his nose itself is well known, too. The scar running across the bridge results from an exploding battery, in the early days of the second-hand business. 'I was charging up two 12V batteries overnight. When I went down to the yard at six o'clock the next morning to get the truck ready for a customer, I failed to switch the power off, and the battery exploded. It blew me back 10ft, and blew a hole in the workshop roof.'

Fortunately, he got blown against the wall right beside a tap, and was able to wash out his eyes.

The accident had its positive side. 'I used to make frequent trips to Scotland looking for used trucks. The scar was a useful means of identification for Scotsmen who weren't quite sure of my credit worthiness.'

Scotland has also made Chris Kelly teetotal. He admits, over a Perrier water, to once having bought a few rust buckets on the strength of some stiff whiskies at Glasgow airport.

Kelly's pace has been hectic. So much so that he's 'only had time' to drive 500miles in one of his prized possessions, a 4.2 E-type roadster that's done only 20,000miles (true).

He has built not only one of the most successful dealerships of the decade, but done so without the backing of one of the large groups which own so many truck outlets.

No longer a one-man-band, he is now boss of a multi-million business which has changed in character since it was set up just a few years ago. Not everyone agrees with or likes the changes at present. But Kelly is driving the business with commitment and imagination, and most people in the Midlands want to see him succeed.

Kelly demands neat parking. E-type is immaculate, but Kelly's pace is too hot – he doesn't have time to drive it

Intermeccanica Indra Spider - 1972 by Perico001

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Techno Classica 2018

Essen

Deutschland - Germany

March 2018

Auction : Coys

Estimated : € 45.000 - 55.000

Construzione Automobili Intermeccanica is an automobile manufacturer founded by Frank Reisner initially based in Italy but subsequently moving to Canada. It is currently headed by Frank’s son, Henry Reisner. The company’s first car was a Formula Junior on a Peugeot engine, followed by further 500cc engined race cars, one of which won at the Nurburgring.

Larger American V8 engines were used in the Apollo GT, of which 101 cars were made for International Motor Cars (1961–1965). The Apollo, the Veltro and later prototypes were designed by Franco Scaglione. The later Italia was a larger GT sports car, of which approximately 500 were made (1966–1972), followed by Murena GT in 1971. With Bitter Cars and Opel, Intermeccanica developed the Indra (1971), followed by a few years assembling the Squire car.

The Indra was presented at the Geneva Automobile Show and was Intermeccanica’s most successful car yet.

Between 1971 and 1974, 125 Indras in three variants, convertible, notchback coupe and fastback coupe were developed and built. In 1973 the Indra was presented at the New York Automobile Show, again with many orders taken and distributorship for U.S. set up. At this stage GM changed policy and stopped supplying both the Chevrolet engines and the Opel parts, as well as advising their Opel dealers in Germany that they were no longer to sell the Indras, with disastrous results for Intermeccanica. Distributor Erich Bitter developed a very similar replacement, the Bitter CD, built by Baur.

One of only 60 Indra Spiders produced, this rare and desirable Italian sportscar is the only known example to be offered on the open market today. Finished in fly yellow with a black interior, the Indra makes an interesting and unusual alternative to the more mainstream sportscars of the 1970s.

Ferrari 250 GT LWB California Spyder (Scaglietti 1959) by Peter Blackert

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s/n 1489GT

240 bhp, 2,953 cc, overhead-camshaft alloy block and head V12 engine, with four-speed gearbox, independent front suspension via A-arms, coil springs and telescopic shocks, and rear suspension via live axle, semi-elliptic springs and hydraulic shocks, and four-wheel hydraulic disc brakes. Wheelbase: 102.4"

- One of only 50 built

- Delivered new to Prince Vittorio Emanuele di Savoia

- Matching numbers

- Multiple awards, including Platinum Award and Pebble Beach class win

The 250 GT Pinin Farina Spyder

Towards the end of 1957, when the Ferrari 250 GT Pinin Farina Cabriolet went into production, a prototype for another open-top car appeared, aimed squarely at the U.S. market. It was called the Ferrari 250 GT California Spyder and was thought by many aficionados to be one of the most beautiful cars ever to come out of Maranello – a view still held by many to this day.

The California Spyder’s development was spurred on by the recognition that Stateside buyers wanted a fast, sparsely equipped convertible Ferrari sports car, the convertible counterpart of the Tour de France berlinettas. Whether it was Luigi Chinetti or John von Neumann who first pointed this out to Ferrari is immaterial. What is important, however, is that Ferrari responded with the California Spyder.

These open cars were quite different in concept and execution to their PF Cabriolet counterparts. The Pinin Farina Cabriolet was based on the Pininfarina Coupe, a luxurious gran turismo. The California Spyder was a much sportier car, based on the dual-purpose berlinettas also designed by Pinin Farina, though built in small numbers in Modena by Carrozzeria Scaglietti, which was partly owned by Ferrari. The procedure was described by Ferrari in their official history and catalogue as a simple one: “Pinin Farina prepared the prototype, which was then sent to Maranello to be inspected by Enzo Ferrari. Although the final decision was naturally his, the dealers also had an important say in the matter and were often called in to give their opinions.” Scaglietti would then take over: “His job was to produce the set number of ‘reproductions’ of the model and to equip himself for the task on the basis of the systems in use at Maranello, which was far more ‘artisan’ in approach than those used by Pinin Farina.”

California Spyder production began in 1958, and some 11 examples had been built by the time it was announced as a separate model in December 1958. All told, 14 California Spyders were built during 1958, with the remaining 36 cars built between 1959 and 1960, including at least three fitted with alloy bodies; they were constructed to full competition specifications.

Certainly in the case of the 250 GT California Spyder, Ferrari’s two US distributors did have serious input in the design of the new car. Luigi Chinetti, who set up the first, and for a while the only, Ferrari dealership in the US, later had all the territory east of the Mississippi River, which amounted to about half the country. Luigi Chinetti was also the founder of NART – the North American Racing Team, the racing arm of Chinetti’s distributorship. The other influential distributor was the Austrian-born John von Neumann, whose racing and dealership interests were based out of California.

Both Chinetti and von Neumann recognized a gap in the market for a higher performance open-top car in America that was not filled by the luxurious 250 GT Cabriolet. It seemed obvious to base this car on the 250 GT Berlinetta (Tour de France), which lacked a convertible version.

The Tour de France was originally known as the 250 GT Berlinetta. The Tour de France nickname was added after the car’s domination of the legendary and grueling ten-day French event, in which the car’s performance, reliability and durability made it a success.

In the end, 14 California Spyders were built during 1958, with the remaining 36 cars built between 1959 and 1960, including at least seven fitted with alloy bodies, constructed to full competition specification. When the 250 GT SWB (short wheelbase) Berlinetta was launched, it was followed shortly thereafter by the corresponding SWB California Spyder, which was introduced at Geneva in March 1960. By the time production came to a close, a total of just 106 California Spyders had been built, 50 of them on the LWB chassis.

One California Spyder was entered by NART at Sebring early in 1959 and driven by Richie Ginther and Howard Hively. It finished ninth overall (behind four Testarossas and four Porsche RSKs) and won the GT class. Le Mans in 1959 conclusively demonstrated the performance of the California Spyder as the NART-entered, alloy-bodied car driven by Bob Grossman and Fernand Tavano finished fifth overall.

Chassis no. 1489 GT

The original left-hand drive LWB California Spyder offered here, s/n 1489 GT, was completed by the factory on September 19th, 1959 as the 32nd of 50 examples that would ultimately be built and was delivered new to its first owner Prince Vittorio Emanuele di Savoia of Italy, resident in Geneva, Switzerland. Born in 1937, Vittorio Emanuele has led quite a colorful life and is the only son of the last King of Italy, Umberto II. He has lived most of his life outside Italy, primarily in Switzerland, following the referendum of 1946, whereby the Italian people voted in favor of a republic. He has worked in a variety of professions, from banker to aircraft salesman and was famously married to Swiss heiress and water skier Marina Ricolfi-Doria.

By 1962, 1489 GT was offered for sale by German racing driver and car dealer Wolfgang Seidel in Dusseldorf. The car was owned by Dr. Hans Hardt of Waldernbach, Germany in the mid-1960s before it was exported to the United States in 1968.

Mrs. Ellis Little of Greenfield, New Hampshire owned the car in 1970, and it has remained stateside ever since. It is known to have been in Philadelphia in 1980 at Mark Smith’s Old Philadelphia Motorcar Corp. before being restored two years later at Bob Smith Coachworks in Gainesville, Texas. At that time, it was converted to covered headlight specification and repainted black with a red stripe and red leather interior.

In 1992 Smith showed the car during the 27th Annual Ferrari Club of America National Meeting in the Washington, DC area, where it placed First in Class Three. Collector Anthony W. Wang then showed the car at the exclusive Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance later in the year, where it again placed first in its class (Class M – Ferrari Custom Coachwork through 1964). The car continued to participate in a number of events, including the Blackhawk Collection invitational at Danville, California and the third annual Colorado Grand in 1991.

Anthony Wang sold the car to RM Classic Cars Inc. in May 1998. While in RM’s possession, the car attended the 1998 FCA National Meet in Toronto, Ontario, where it was involved in both the track day and the concours, at which it won a gold award.

In September of 1998, Richard Sirota, another noted collector from New York, acquired the car and brought it to the Cavallino Classic in Palm Beach the following year, where it won the coveted Platinum Award. In fact, Sirota also participated in the Colorado Grand in 1999. One year later it was sold to a very prominent collection in Japan and later shown in 2004 at The Quail – A Motorsports Gathering in Carmel Valley. Noted enthusiast Enrique Landa purchased the car in 2006, brought it back to The Quail the same year and, once again, participated in the Colorado Grand.

The current owner has enjoyed the car since the summer of 2008. It has fulfilled its objective in providing sunny afternoon drives, trips to concours and shows and is certain to fulfill those same for its new owner. Few cars are as perpetually desirable, timelessly gorgeous and rarely available as a Ferrari California Spyder. This is one of the finest examples we’ve ever offered.

[Text from RM Auctions]

www.rmauctions.com/mo10/sports--classics-of-monterey/lots...

This Lego miniland-scale Ferrari 250 GT LWB California Spyder' (1959 - Scaglietti), has been created for Flickr LUGNuts' 89th Build Challenge, - "Over a Million, Under a Thousand", - a challenge to build vehicles valued over one million (US) dollars, or under one thousand (US) dollars.

This particular vehicle was auctioned by the RM Auction house on Saturday, August 14, 2010, where it sold for $2,612,500.

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