RISING TO THE OCCATION

How does a company running childcare centres become one of South East Queensland’s largest and most successful bus and coach companies? Damn good question, and one that involves an intriguing and fascinating answer. We take a look at Belbaker, one of the real success stories of the bus charter business and how it has risen to the occasion.

The Belbaker story is all about turning a good Samaritan act into a successful bus charter business, which came about as a result of offering a local school a hand when its bus kept breaking down.

The offer to help the school with the small 13 seat commuter bus that Belbaker had for its own Childcare operations continued on, and after a time morphed from being a favour for the sake of the community to being a paid job

Belbaker’s managing director Adam Baker said that it all started with transport for four children and ten years later it has grown into a major bus operation operating across Brisbane and the Gold Coast.

The key factor which led to such rapid growth with Belbaker, comes from Adam’s history of running the family-owned business, he reckons.

“This started with my mother and father and the Baker family’s background in running childcare centres, which is an industry we’ve been in for 53 years,” Adam added.

“What actually happened to get the ball rolling, was that the local school bus broke down, they rang me because they knew we had a 13-seater minibus, and asked us if we could help them out transporting the kids,” said Adam.

“The same thing happened a couple of days later and a couple of days after that, and they asked how much we were going to charge them,” he added.

“We never intended to make the school pay for the use of the bus until the principal pleaded with me to take some payment for our efforts.

“That’s when I decided it was time to get our first Fuso Rosa 24-seater,” he said.

Since then, Belbaker has grown into one of the most successful charter businesses in the industry.

Now charter company Belbaker is Adam Baker’s pride and joy, having come a very long way in just over ten years.

“It’s been an amazing journey so far, “said Adam. “Our plans for growth in the future are in place, particularly with the 2032 Brisbane Olympics just over the horizon.”

After starting with a single 13-seater, Belbaker now operates a fleet of 70 buses and coaches, moving hundreds of school children and charter passengers every day.

Baker attributes the company’s success to the high standard everyone sets for themselves and others.

“We’ve found that the best method is to always keep raising the bar and trying to be better,” he said.

“WE ALWAYS TRY TO PROVIDE THE BEST PRODUCT TO OUR CUSTOMERS WITH SALES STAFF WHO ARE ALWAYS FOLLOWING UP AND TRYING TO BUILD BETTER RELATIONSHIPS WITH THOSE PEOPLE”

“We always try to provide the best product to our customers with sales staff who are always following up and trying to build better relationships with those people.

“I think that’s part of the key to our success.”

The business now incorporates charter, school run, and contracted operations, as well as continuing to operate Nurseryland Early Learning Centres.

The Belbaker depot is almost entirely self- sufficient, with a refuelling station, bus washer, and a workshop. In fact, Belbaker recently opened a new dedicated depot and maintenance facility in Brisbane’s near Northern Suburbs, not far from Brisbane Airport.

The Belbaker charter operation HQ can house 62 of the fleet’s buses, and it features its own 32000 litre fuel storage tanks, maintenance and cleaning facilities.

“It’s part of our culture of quality and attention to detail,” said Adam Baker.

“It is purpose-built facility that has been designed to specifically meet our requirements and we also keep some buses at a satellite facility at Springfield and also at the Gold Coast so we can service operations in those areas faster and more efficiently.”

“We have our own mechanic who handles all the regular services on all our vehicles and any maintenance issues, and we have a team of five cleaners who come in every day to clean the buses,” he added.

“We also do a full external wash of five buses every day, so the fleet is constantly kept clean and tidy.

“That is really important in terms of ensuring presentation and image to customers is at the highest level, but it is also a service to our drivers because it is important that they have a good work environment and that they can concentrate on driving without having to worry about cleaning the buses,” he added.

As part of that ethos Belbaker provides breakfast at the depot each morning and once a month has a food truck on site for staff to get together and enjoy some nice food. It is all about engendering loyalty and giving something back to the loyal staff.

The size of the operation and the need to account for every school student getting on and off their buses, has now led Belbaker into another business opportunity, clearly demonstrating the flexibility and business nous of Adam and his team.

“It is one of those cases of necessity being the mother of invention I suppose,” said Adam Baker.

“We had a massive school charter and there were 28 buses and about 1800 students and it led us to figure we needed a technology answer to the challenge,” he added.

The solution was to come up with a software package called RollBook, which was developed by Belbaker in collaboration with the University of Queensland that enables every student to use a card to tap on and off the bus and record every passenger, making it easy to keep track of students and to ensure no one is left behind or lost.

“It has been a big project, but it is proving a vital tool to ensure efficient operations when transporting students in particular,” said Adam.

In that regard Baker says that ensuring the operation has the best equipment to handle the task of transporting people is another vital ingredient in the mix.

In the last few years Belbaker has established a strong relationship with BLK having bought its first Chinese built bus from BLK about six years ago.

“We have a great relationship with BLK, and some people thought we were taking a risk when we bought our first one, but they have been very good, reliable, well equipped and comfortable for our passengers,” said Adam.

“When we first looked at them on paper they appeared to be very strong given they had Cummins engines, Allison transmissions and excellent componentry and that has proven to be a correct call because they have been excellent.”

“More importantly BLK has been extremely easy to deal with and provided excellent service which at times is above and beyond what we would have expected, so that is fantastic,” he added.

BLKs make up the majority of the Belbaker fleet these days with 28 of the 70-bus fleet wearing the BLK badge. Along with those BLKs it also has a number of Volgrens, some Irizars, a Daewoo, three Dennings, seven smaller Higers and seven Rosas along with a handful of various minibuses including some Renault Masters.

The oldest bus on the Belbaker books is about seven years old and the company is actively pursuing a philosophy of renewing and maintaining a modern, advanced fleet that has the best safety and equipment levels.

“Safety is our number one priority, and we ensure our buses have the best possible

safety spec, including ABS, and we specify automatic transmissions because they allow the driver to concentrate on the job at hand and not have to worry about changing gear, a factor that also reduces fatigue,” said the Belbaker boss.

“Our drivers love the Allison transmissions in the BLKs, and they have proved to be very economical and reliable as well,” he said.

In the company’s relatively short history, it has become a transport charter provider to hundreds of schools, as well as providing government transport for projects such as Brisbane’s G20 Summit and the Legacy Way tunnel.

Looking to the future, Adam Baker says that the announcement that Brisbane has won the 2032 Olympic Games and that they will be held across Brisbane, the Gold Coast and the Sunshine Coast is an exciting prospect and something that could bring an enormous boost to businesses such as Belbaker.

“The Olympics is very exciting and something we are looking forward to, but that is 11 years away and there is a lot of water to flow under the bridge before then, but we will be prepared.

Baker says that the company’s five-year plan is to grow to 100 buses and to further expand into the Sunshine Coast.

‘We will expand the fleet by another 30 buses over that time and take in move into the Sunshine Coast over the next five years and then we will re-evaluate for the second half of the decade heading toward the Olympics,” Baker said.

“We want to have relationships with the other bus businesses on the north side of Brisbane because there are some great businesses up here,” he added.

“There are some businesses that come and go, but we won’t be going,” Baker affirms with some confidence.

Given the growth in the bus charter business so far, along with the very positive attitude of Adam Baker in leading the operation and the ongoing success of the childcare business as well as the success of the new RollBook software business, it is a pretty fair bet that BelBaker will be there and play a significant role in moving people around South Eastern Queensland when the games of the 35th Olympiad arrive in 2032.