Whanganui's Sharp As Linehaul owners Daryl James and Kylie Penn expand business

Sharp As Linehaul owners Daryl James and Kylie Penn have big plans for their expanding business.

Whanganui's Sharp As Linehaul has won a major new contract and expanded other parts of its business, with its team set to increase to about 65 staff.

Daryl James set up Sharp As Linehaul in 2001 with one truck and now operates a fleet of 11 trucks. Partner Kylie Penn, formerly operations manager for Hockey Wanganui, wanted to get back into running a business. She joined the day-to-day operation of the business and they decided to make changes.

James and Penn have finalised a partnership with Southern Milk Transport, part of Open Country Dairy, to cart milk from farms in the Horowhenua to Taranaki region to the Open Country Dairy processing plant in Whanganui.

Sharp As will supply 18 trucks, with 12 new Scania R500 vehicles being purchased, and the labour force to operate them.

The partnership will begin in January 2019 and will be in full swing by the beginning of August.

Another change for the business came about after James and Penn identified there was a market to start a new diesel workshop business in Whanganui because James often had to take his fleet out of town for servicing.

The project moved faster than anticipated and their workshop in Rakau Rd opened for business in July.

"It was a matter of the right property coming along at the right time," Penn said.

They employed experienced workshop manager Wayne Wright to look after the day-to-day running of the workshop. It now employs three workshop technicians, with a fourth likely to be added in early 2019.

"We knew Wayne was going to be a critical key to this division of the business, given the strong relationships he has established over a number of years in the transport industry," Penn said.

Another small key part of the Rakau Rd business is commercial leasing and a few of the buildings are now tenanted.

With the new milk transport contract and the existing businesses, James and Penn anticipate that they will employ about 65 staff across all divisions.

Their philosophy is "wanting to keep things real and keeping it family and community focused" so they liked Open Country's emphasis on family. James' son Mason James is a key employee in the business and James' and Penn's fathers have been in the transport industry all their lives.

"We are a hands-on business where we enjoy the personal local contact, so we see this as being all in this together," James said.