In 2020 Kelkay conducted a strategic review of its supply chain, identifying opportunities to provide a better service to its customers and improve performance. 

Meeting all Kelkay’s requirements as a result of the review, Wincanton is now its exclusive transport and logistics partner. This includes managing the movement of some 20,000 orders per year from Kelkay’s site in Pollington, East Yorkshire, for distribution to over 2,000 retail locations across the UK and Ireland. 

Kelkay has been growing rapidly and spent 2020 preparing for high levels of growth. Due to what it described as ‘exceptional and unprecedented demand’, Kelkay increased space by adding a further site to accommodate an additional two million bags of aggregates in December 2020 and has been utilising double shift patterns to ensure that filling lines are being managed to maximum efficiency.

To meet Kelkay’s needs, Wincanton has established a transport planning and customer service team – based in Wigan – to manage load movements, utilising Wincanton’s fleet network. Transport execution is led by a team based at Kelkay’s site in Pollington, East Yorkshire, where the core transport fleet is based, and all finished goods deliveries are dispatched. 

From here Wincanton manages a full range of responsibilities including driver management, transport compliance, driver and subcontractor despatch and the logging of vehicle service and repairs, all adhering to the highest health and safety standards. All trailers are preloaded ready for collection before delivering to customers, and drivers perform ‘reasonable’ checks of the integrity and condition of goods placed for loading by the despatching Kelkay site. 

To support peak operations and provide full geographic coverage, Wincanton adopts a 4PL approach, utilising the services of approved network partners. 

All of this is underpinned by Wincanton’s market-leading Winsight platform, integrating transport management systems (TMS) technology that improves route-planning and fleet utilisation alongside Point of Delivery services that transform the customer experience.

James Hoad, AMES UK Supply Chain Director

"Our partnership with Wincanton is key to delivering our ambitious and exciting growth plans, and the Wincanton team is now seamlessly embedded in our organisation. Their highly professional approach, together with enormous flexibility, gives us the logistics capacity to handle the rapid growth in our business.”