LEGENDS
Barry Stamp T
E AWAMUTU BASED OPERATOR Barry Stamp has been in the transport industry for around half a century. Over the time he has successfully been at the helm of a business that introduced scores of drivers (including his son Mitch) into the industry, and that’s why he’s a Southpac legend. “I don’t really know what got me into it” was how Barry opened up our conversation, “I started driving trucks for something to do and have been doing it ever since.” Barry laughs. Of course these are tongue in cheek statements but Barry Stamp has evidently come a long way from his first job, which was working on sheep stations in Gisborne. Stamp says, “I quickly realized that I wouldn’t be owning a sheep station anytime soon, so I packed up and shifted to the Waikato.” Barry started his trucking career in 1972 when he jumped behind the wheel for Dibble Brothers. Established by Eric and Colin Dibble, the business was essentially
60 | Truck & Driver
formed to make bulk hauling and spreading of fertiliser quicker and cheaper. Prior to 1953, fertiliser found its way onto farms via a cumbersome sequence of bags that were transported mainly from Auckland on rail and then transferred to drills that were towed behind tractors. The Dibble Brothers created a bulk spreader solution with specialist spreading trucks that they designed and built themselves and virtually changed the process overnight. Stamp says, “I drove for them for maybe four or five years, spreading fert and lime all over the Waikato. I then had a break for a couple of years, where I went and had an overseas experience.” I came back in 1980 and bought a 40ft semi-trailer and was carting containers out of Tauranga for 12 months, before selling and returning to Dibbles Bros in 1981 when the bulk trucks came up for sale. Dibble Brothers sold a truck with a licence to work around the area. In 1981, Dibble Bros sold the spreading side of its business to concentrate on
building a burnt lime plant. Back then, the company was running a large fleet of vehicles and staff. Stamp says that he established a bond with some of the drivers who also brought a truck so they decided to form an alliance, Stamp was just twenty eight years old. “And that’s when we started a small group called Dibble Independent Transport and I’ve pretty much been here ever since,” he says. Dibble Independent Transport was a group of five drivers keen to make their mark. Barry Stamp, Derek Smith, the late Geoff Dibble, the late Alf Quaife and NZ Truck and Driver’s very own Trevor Woolston. Stamp recalls, “We all came together and it worked quite well from the start but then over the years it slowly split up. Trevor started a magazine, Alf sold out to Roger Hurst, that sort of thing. And then it ended up just the three of us, Geoff, Derek and myself and that’s how Dibble Transport 97 started.” According to Stamp, the three
