Talkin' Trucks With Mike:A History of the TNT Companies

Are there any remaining United terminals on the Reddaway system?

 

To my knowledge only two United locations remain on the Reddaway system; the both ones
in Montana : it's Billings and Great Falls

 

Note to @road_runner

 

Today in Lansing I saw a TST Overland truck leaving the GM Aftersales Care building. Because of this thread it stood out to me.

 

During the time that I read all the posts of this thread, I realized that people didn't know why
TNT used so much different brands which, they though, could bring a lot of confusion.

The comparaison with Fedex and UPS is not really appropriate because TNT operated in a totally other context. The two American carriers operated in a sole market (parcels & mail) and
grew inside the world biggest economy. At the opposite, TNT built its empire based in the isolated continent of Australia with a population smaller than the one of Canada. So, TNT has
to be a highly diversified carrier to get a critical mass in the purpose to be profitable.

Since the beginning, the TNT management envisioned the corporate structure of the Group as
having the central TNT business operating on a large worldwide scale accompanied by smaller businesses with their own brand names owned by TNT operating independently
and competing with each other. The Group management saw competition within the firm as the best way for the Group as a whole to grow and profit. Also the multimodal vision of trans
port operations :

`` WE TAKE THE VIEW THAT THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IS THE FREIGHT AND
THEN WE CARRY IT WITH THE MEDIUM WHICH IS THE MOST SUITABLE ``

Sir Peter Abeles, TNT Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer

+ the strategy to settle many partnerships with other carriers in the purpose to grow more
rapidly and at less cost has favored the emergence of numerous trademarks. With over 50 distinct services in so widespread fields spanning from

Hand delivery of mail and small sachels


to

Haul of oversize extra heavy loads


within between for example

Refrigerated products carried by a 56% controlled partnership company


Containers shipped over océans


or

Passengers flying throughout a continent


The best way to do business according to the TNT management was to operate small to medium regional and/or specialized carriers benefiting of the support from the holding
(TNT) with huge resources.

 

I hope this time that the last picture will show

 

I get the idea of succeeding in a smaller market by offering a wide range of services, but they went on to North America and Europe. Did they adapt to those conditions or try to approach every continent like Oz?

I'm still not understanding why they aren't around if they weren't having identity issues, they clearly had everything else that they needed, in triplicate or more.

It seems like there was a period of tremendous tangled growth and then a period of divestiture and disappearance in all but name. What drove that shrinkage and loss?

If you haven't read it, @Mike2633 did a nicely compacted history of CF on this forum; their downfall included owning and operating airplanes. Was TNT's airline operation profitable?

And isn't there an irony that UPS and Fedex fought over the last viable bones? Will that last vestige get rebranded?