An interview with Fred Delahaye, by Steve Jordan.
It was back in 2014 that The Mover first reported on Fred Delahaye’s new Go Group, that aimed to provide high quality baggage moving services to a demanding clientele. Today, seven years on, Fred believes that the market for this kind of high class, consolidated service is continuing to grow. The development of his business seems to prove it.
Go Group started in 2011 and has now developed to include employees in the United States, Hong Kong, others in Belgium and France and a new operation and warehouse in the UK. The events of the last two years, in which the industry has been flipped into confusion has, according to Fred, accentuated the need for flexibility in the services provided. “It’s highlighted the need to look at different ways of doing things,” he said.
The USA has been a good example where the market has been very traditional. “Businesses are often run on family lines and don’t want to change,” Fred said. “By operating a global consolidation business, where service is on the corporate level, we have been able to offer financial savings with a contribution to sustainability as well.”
One increasingly popular solution is to offer a groupage service to corporations. This is something they have shrunk away from in the past but, with escalating freight rates worldwide, they have now been left with little choice. In some cases, Go Group has also been able to facilitate groupage services for individual customers, giving them the opportunity to fill their own containers, taking advantage of the space savings while retaining a stronger element of control over the shipment itself.
“People’s expectations of groupage have changed so everybody needs to communicate more effectively because there are more questions to answer,” said Fred. “The reliability of your partner needs to be much stronger so that you can get the speed and efficiency of response you need.”
Taking opportunities
At the beginning of the pandemic Go Group opened a new 35,000 sq ft warehouse in the UK. “Everyone thought we were insane,”
said Fred ...
Photo: Fred Delahaye.