The seasons seem to me to be changing. And I don’t mean spring, summer, autumn and winter. I am talking about the coaching seasons.
It is not so long ago that we would expect to make a loss in January and February, recover in March, and then turn a profit for the following nine months. We never got worried about having drivers standing around in the off-season. It was just how it was.
We tried lots of things to increase turnover then – more holidays, day trips, and even seasonal discounts, but nothing seemed to work. Often, drivers would go home between schools for their sanity (and mine).
It was too cold and wet to do any deep cleaning, and every coach operator will tell you that having too many drivers spending hours in the canteen is not a good idea!
We used to test all our vehicles (two per week) from the first week after Christmas until they were all done so they were ready for the season. Driver CPC modules and any other training was factored into January and February. Some drivers headed off to sunnier countries for winter holidays, and the part-time staff were not needed to get out of bed for a school run.
Post pandemic, that has massively changed. This January’s turnover was 16% up on last year, which is incredible given that the schools around here did not break up until 23 December. The last three years have seen us produce figures that if I hadn’t seen them with my own eyes, I would have been sceptical of.
February is showing similar promise, and the usual half-term Driver CPC courses are looking harder to accommodate than they have ever been.
We have sold out holidays in January and run day excursions. The old arguments that stopped people booking – it would be too cold, or we would be 6ft deep in snow – no longer seem to apply. Our radius of schools has increased dramatically over the last three years, so we are also busier on that side of the business as well.
That means we are changing our testing schedule. Bringing some forward and spreading them around the year. Drivers’ holidays are more flexible as well. When you are busy all year round, it doesn’t really matter when employees take time off. Drivers and office staff seem to appreciate the increased flexibility as well.
The older I get, the more I seem to look back on the steadier start to the year with increased fondness – even though, at the time, it drove me mad, and I was always worried that we would never pick up later in the year.
When I speak to other coach operators, they are in a similar position. It appears to me that coaching now has just one season: Busy!
