Sainsburys have made the decision to limit the speed of its lorries to 50 mph. So from now on don’t be surprised if you see this on the road, after all, they are just following the company policy:

50mph and no more…

Whilst Sainsbury’s has yet to answer calls about its reasoning behind the speed limit introduction, its drivers had no such shyness in expressing their opinions.

Jon Garner says: ”I was being overtaken a hell of a lot, which you can understand, and on three occasions I had to drop down to around 45mph to enable people to enter the motorway network. Have they set the limiter too low at 50mph? I don’t think having to drop down to a speed of around 45mph to keep the road running smoothly is safe.”

Further more, a Sainsbury’s agency driver reckons other lorry drivers think they are ‘messing around’ and are cutting in as closely as possible.

In our opinion, whilst this speed limiter may be good for fuel saving and CO2 emissions reduction, Sainsbury’s may end up putting their drivers in constant frustrations on the road, which is a contributing factor to road accidents.

So will this policy do more good than harm? We are frankly not very sure.

It seems like there is an emerging opportunity for retired truckers: create hand made miniature wagons!

Well, the reality is if you have 30 years and a great enthusiasm for miniature then you can do it. Jack Spittle, aged 87, a former lorry driver from Fallings Park, Wolverhampton, gave up his haulage work 30 years ago, but has since dedicated three decades on recreating the nation’s most iconic lorries.

Jack Spittle with one of his creation

Jack’s passion with trucks began at the age of five when he saw his father drive them and by the age of 10 he had begun making his first models for a hobby which would last him a lifetime. In his early days he used cardboard to create the models but now he uses plastic to put the vehicles together giving them the style of finish which could be found in a toy shop.

He said: ”The finished products aren’t just look-a-likes, they have the exact seats in the cabs, as well as the dashboards and they are all perfectly modelled.They take weeks or months each to finish, because I always make sure they look just like the real thing.”

Up to now, the haulage veteran has amassed more than 120 of the model vehicles including old city firms like Eddie Stobart Limited, an express haulage specialist, Stan Smith & Sons, a carrier for the furniture trade, Goodyear and Stan Robinson Limited, another haulage group.

Some of Jack Spittle’s most famous models

Despite having received countless offers to buy the miniature trucks with some up to £2,000, the self-confessed model nut insists he will never sell any of them.

At Shiply, we were all wowed when hearing about Jack’s story. Once again, George Eliot’s well-known saying was proved right: “It is never too late to be what you might have been.”

No sooner have we landed back in England following our success in Amsterdam with the Postcode Lottery Green Challenge that we hear yet more fantastic news.

Shiply.com has reached the final round in the Shell liveWire Young Entrepreneur of the Year Awards.

We have also reached the final of Startups 2009 in the green business of the year and best use of technology categories.

We eagerly anticipate the final judging and assessment days.

Shiply.com has been awarded with the Dutch Postcode Lottery Green Challenge runner-up prize of €100,000!

Robert Matthams (left), our founder, presented a concise pitch to the judges and were amongst three winners of the competition, bringing a €100,000 prize back to England. Hjalmar van Raemdonck (right) of Ephicas picked up the other €100,000 prize with their truly amazing side-wing for HGV’s.

The overall winner with €500,000 was Dean Gregory (centre), another Brit, with his low-cost rooftop turbine which can capture wind power even in low-wind conditions.

The Postcode Lottery Green Challenge is created to encourage the development of new, innovative, creative and yet commercially viable products and/or services that contribute to an eco-friendly lifestyle, directly reduce greenhouse gas emissions and score highly on convenience, quality and design.

Amongst hundreds of green business ideas being sent to the competition all over the world, six were chosen as the finalists. In the final round, the competition was so intense that Robert Matthams admitted: “We were up against a really strong competition and I was really surprised. As the Award Ceremony went on I was thinking less and less that we’re going to win. To get the runner up prize is just fantastic. We can do so much with this money and we are going to.”

Back at the Shiply offices, we were all following the competition attentively with a strong hope that we were going to win. And we did!

So let us share the good news with you, our valued members. We would like to take this chance to thank you all so much as without you, this would never have been possible.

Here’s the video of the awards ceremony:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y8R34gag9r8]

Royal Mail last night admitted that at least nine million items of post are either delayed or caught up in problems. A ballot has shown that a proposed 2/3 of the workforce are preparing for a natonal strike which will cause further chaos.

Strike action has already been underway since June 19th, with postal workers on strike in some part of the country once every other day. This staggered striking system has caused the severe delays resuting in 1 in 8 items of post officially being undelivered.

The union believe the actual number of delayed post is in excess of 25 million.

Proposed full national strike action, if it goes ahead will be the worst seen since 2007.

Small business leaders said that the disruption is now a “national strike in all but name”. Stephen Alambritis, spokesman for the Federation of Small Businesses, said: “The strikes are affecting everyone – and it is more hurtful because of their sporadic nature. It is hitting small businesses from John O’ Groats to Land’s End. This is a national strike in all but name.”

It is estimated that already tens of billions of pounds of cheques are either or delayed or stranded in the postal system. Over a third of utility customers are still refusing to pay their bills by direct debit and most small businesses are of course reliant on these postal payments.

Mark Higson, the Royal Mail’s managing director, said: “The CWU leadership is well aware that it has already agreed all the changes Royal Mail is making.

“We urge them to recognise the tough economic conditions faced by all our customers and Royal Mail itself and to live up to their claims to support modernisation and to focus – as the company is doing- on delivering the postal service on which so many customers depend.”

At Shiply, we agree that modernisation has to happen at Royal Mail, however this should not be used as an excuse to cut jobs & costs, rather a way to improve the service for everyone involved.

It’s time for Friday’s video as always. Now this one is shockingly bad quality, but still hilariously funny.

It certainly will make you think about whether or not that short cut you take is worth it in the future!

Enjoy your weekend.

http://www.liveleak.com/e/023_1220444169

In what seemed to us as actually quite a good idea by La Poste in France, has been met by strike action by French metro workers!

La Poste proposed to solve the missed delivery service problem by using Metro stations as holding points for packages and post. This would then enable commuters to pick up their parcel deliveries on the way home.

In theory, it’s a good option. In practice, however, it raises all sorts of issues. In particular that of security. You can’t even find a bin to put your rubbish in on Subway systems these days, let alone leave packages. With today’s terrorist threats, this simply would not work.

The idea was that if a person missed a delivery, the parcel / mail would be forwarded onto their local metro station. They would be sent a text message alerting them of this and be able to pick up any day of the week up until 11.30pm. So, all very convenient.

La Poste are to trial the idea at just one station next month. However, the French subway workers, were having none of it! In fact over 1/3 of them from the entire network went on strike!

Union spokesman Cédric Ménival said: “We have more important things to do, like looking after passengers’ security and giving them information. What will they ask us to do tomorrow? Sell bread?”

It’s Friday, so time for a video! This one had us in stiches here at the Shiply offices.

http://embed.break.com/593274

Quick thinking lorry driver Dyfrig Willis prevented catastrophe when he saw a runaway car heading down a hill through Evanstown in Gilfach Goch. A 4-year-old boy was inside the car and the handbrake had been released.

Spotting the immediate danger and hearing the screams of his mother Amy Morgan, Dyfrig planted his 15-ton lorry diagonally across the street. His quick plan did the trick and the car crashed into the side coming to a stop before careering down to the busy main road.

Ms Morgan, said: “He made such a difference to us but he seemed embarrassed by it all.

“It happened after I parked the car and as I got out I went to go to the other side and I heard a noise and the car was rolling past me.

“Dyfrig’s lorry came up the hill and was driven in its path and we both tried to stop it but we couldn’t and it went into the lorry.

Mr Willis said: “If the car had gone past the truck it would have gone down a huge hill and onto the main road.

“I don’t want to think about what might have happened. It is such a big hill and it is as straight as a dart. It is about 30 degrees and pretty steep.

“I didn’t think much about it. I made sure everybody was okay and exchanged details and went about my normal day.

“As I work for a builders’ merchant, every time I turn up to a site, they are all on about it. I’m getting a bit of a ribbing.”

A Carlsberg lorry yesterday shed it’s load of kegs on a busy Suffolk road.

Passers-by said that the lorry took a sharp turn and a dozen or so kegs flew off in every direction.

Elly Henson, who was in the traffic next to the lorry when the kegs fell off, said: “The side of the lorry was made of material and it looked like it may have come undone and then they fell off as it went round the corner.

“The kegs were all over the road, there was a wall that had been smashed in and the local bus stop had also been hit.

“The whole junction was just covered in beer kegs.”

Miss Henson, of Saxmundham, added: ““I saw the lorry driver and he was just scratching his head.”

Luckily no-one was hurt, and the local drunk was on the scene within minutes to assess the spilt load.