All vehicles feature a Nauman Wireless tracking systems
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s one of the UK’s largest bed and bedroom furniture solution providers, Starplan sells direct to the customer from its network of factory stores. At Starplan, you can choose from one of the widest ranges of bedroom furniture in the UK - from free-standing bedrooms to luxurious fitted bedrooms, with a fantastic choice of colours, styles and budgets to suit everyone. The company’s focus is on giving exceptional service from design and manufacturer through to delivery and installation. All employees are professionally trained and the level of customer care afforded to the consumer from Starplan is simply second to none. For the best-quality fitted children’s bedrooms, modern bedrooms and traditional bedrooms, sliding wardrobes; freestanding furniture from Solo, Solsbury and Allure; and Vono beds – Starplan should be your first-choice one-stop shop. Founder / managing director Mervyn Wilson opened his first furniture showroom 40 years ago, in 1972. Determined to offer top-quality bedroom furniture and beds at good value prices and to give customers the highest possible level of service, he opened the first Starplan factory in Dungannon, County Tyrone in 1978. employing ten staff members. At last, he was able to guarantee quality, delivery and prices in line with his original vision! As word spread and the company developed, the factory was expended with more showrooms opening around the country. Mervyn wasn’t content to simply follow fashion and trends – he wanted to set them. As such, Starplan has become a pioneering force in the beds and bedroom furniture manufacturing / delivery / installation sector. Today, with a 150,000 sq. ft. purpose-built factory boasting state-of-the-art European machinery and a workforce of up to 200 people, Starplan is one of the leading direct-sales bedroom furniture companies delivering to over 15,000 homes in the UK every year. However, it remains very much a family business which will always put the customer first. Transport manager Declan Rafferty explains: “Mervyn literally started selling furniture out of a car and trailer before
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opening his first premises outside Dungannon and starting to manufacture. In the ‘seventies, he built a factory in an industrial estate and that served us until, in 2002, he opened the existing state-of-the-art facility close to Dungannon, which serves as our manufacturing base and also has a showroom built in. “This is our flagship premises. All the manufacturing takes place here and the furniture is then shipped to England through McNeill Transport in Ballyclare.” Declan has been with the company since 1984, working in a number of different departments before joining the transport section of the operation in 1992. As transport manager, he currently oversees a fleet of twelve vehicles out of the HQ, twelve more in the Birmingham depot and five in the Manchester (Warrington) depot. The decision to install Navman Wireless vehicle tracking technology was taken in 2010 as part of Starplan’s ongoing commitment to operating an effective fleet in order to guarantee an exceptional level of customer service. As Starplan can make up to 110 deliveries per day across the UK, the tracking system helps them keep everything on schedule, resulting in better fleet management, improved teamwork, increased productivity and greater fuel efficiency. “We can see where all the vehicles are at any given time with just the push of a button and we have also benefited from a 25% reduction in insurance costs as well as the obvious savings in terms of diesel usage,” Declan notes. “While this was an expensive system to install, we have always looked at the long-term benefits of technology and we expect it to start paying for itself within the next three or four years.” Starplan runs a fresh fleet of Ivecos, all of which are kept within a four-year contract. “They’re all purchased from NI Trucks in Belfast, with a full contract maintenance package,” confirms Declan. “We find this to be the most economical arrangement and we have five new units coming in at the end of the month.” The collapse of the Republic of Ireland market saw Starplan switch its focus more and more to the UK mainland, where IRISH TRUCKER & LIGHT COMMERCIALS