Have passport, will travel
Air Cargo News, a fortnightly tabloid then based in Feltham, opened my eyes to the world beyond local newspapers. I travelled to Japan, Hong Kong, Dubai, the US, continental Europe. I even went on the Miami inaugural flight with Virgin Atlantic with Richard Branson dressed as Peter Pan, John Hurt and some Sun Page 3 girls.
There were trips to New York with British Airways, listening to the late and great Geoff Bridges, the true philosopher of airfreight who was a kind and thoughtful man who was prepared to give of his time to a stupid young reporter (that’s me) who had forgotten to put new batteries into his cassette tape recorder.
There were also trips with British Caledonian, which was to be taken over by BA. I learnt an important lesson about advertising from my publisher at ACN.
While I salivated at the prospect of the front page alliterative headline: BA buys BCal, he pointed out that two competitive rivals with large advertising budgets had become one and would spend less. I never forgot that wisdom. But still, it was a great story.
We also wrote about the emerging express parcels companies from the US, who were going to kill of freight forwarders and cargo airlines. I couldn’t even spell UPS, let alone FedEx. Fred Smith, is that a real name?
British Shipper & Forwarder
Tabmag Publishing also owned British Shipper & Forwarder, which was a monthly magazine aimed at shippers, the end customer who pays for the carriage of freight, whether by deep sea container, rail, road or air.
My travelling was more around the UK, interviewing shipping managers about their daily job. At that time, the shipping manager was a lowly individual with no boardroom clout, and the words logistics and supply chain never passed their lips, let alone kanban.
I remember one elderly lady shipping manager in a small office with an oddly shaped bit of metal keeping the door open. I had to ask, what is it? It was, she said, part of the Blue Streak navigation system. Time to move on, and I did, to International Freighting Weekly (IFW).
