Family business puts its faith in Hartshorne, Volvo and I-Shift

Founded in 1973, N J Docksey Ltd. is a family-owned haulage company run by husband and wife team Nigel and Linda Docksey. Although well-known for their bulk powder transport service, the company also offers general haulage to a wide range of customers.

The company, which is based at Leek, Staffordshire, has recently taken delivery of two new Volvo tractor units to augment the busy fleet - an FH-480 and an FH-520. Both the new trucks were supplied by Volvo Dealer Hartshorne from their Potteries branch in Newcastle under Lyme.

Nigel Docksey, Director and son of the founder said,” We’ve been buying Volvo’s from Hartshornes for twenty-three years. Our first Volvo was bought by my father and I bought mine fourteen years ago. The back-up from Hartshorne’s is very good. I can just pick up the phone to them if I ever need anything sorting.”

Nigel continued “My Dad bought my first truck when I was seventeen and when I was twenty-three, I had the first ever-Volvo on the fleet. This was an FL7 which covered over one million miles and was on the fleet for over twenty-two years. Fourteen years ago, I went on my own when my Dad semi-retired and I’ve been buying Volvo’s ever since. They’re good on fuel and very reliable.”

“The latest additions to the fleet are both equipped with I-Shift, which we’ve been specifying since 2003,” explains Nigel,” We’ve now got half the fleet with I-Shift. It’s a lot smoother than a manual gearbox. Once drivers get used to it, they really like it and don’t want to change. In my opinion, I-Shift is the best out of all the automated gearboxes on the market.”

Half the N J Docksey fleet is used for general haulage with curtainsider trailers transporting pre-packed building materials such as sand, gravel to builder’s merchants and trade outlets. The rest of the fleet haul powder tanks, usually containing cement or mortar.