Call Sign December 2007 - Page 12 - ALLEN TOGWELL’S MARKETING PLACE

ALLEN TOGWELL’S MARKETING PLACE
Allen looks at Dial-a-Cab and the environment… Being forced into doing something against our will and at a cost few could afford, does little to encourage us to do anything in a similar vein voluntarily. I refer in this instance to the Transport for London directive that all taxis should be fitted with energy saving emissions reduction systems. The consensus of opinion by many is having been forced into paying a large sum of money for emission-reducing equipment, which in many instances was not necessary? Why should they do anything more to help the environment voluntarily? Unfortunately, saving the environment is a very serious issue and it can only be achieved by literally everybody playing their part in every way possible, willingly or otherwise. In the Chairman’s Call Sign article last month he spoke at length about Dial-a-Cab’s Carbon Footprint commitment, including the necessity to make our clients aware of that commitment and what we are doing to offset the carbon that is produced whenever they use our vehicles. For many years I used to be responsible for replying to tenders, the contents of which have now grown enormously. Since those early days when the two primary questions were the size of fleet and the system of dispatching the work. Then with the market place becoming more competitive and	clients more demanding, tenders became more complex and grew to 100 odd pages of issues, many of which one wondered what they had to do with supplying a taxi service? The problem was that if the questions were ignored or insufficiently answered, it weakened the chances of retaining or capturing the account. Now in addition to tenders looking something akin to the Maarstricht Treaty, the big issue of the moment is the environment and believe me this issue is big, very big. So much so that the retention of many of our senior clients could depend on our Society’s carbon footprint policy. Needless to say our competitors, also mindful of its importance, are resorting to desperate measures by making all sorts claims on their vehicles such as having the only carbon free taxi fleet in London etc, when in truth they probably have no more than a dozen cabs running on 5% of biofuel. However, in our case our carbon footprint is being applied	part directly ie that by which we operate within Dial-a-Cab House such as automatic lighting, solar panel heating etc, and part indirectly ie we are offsetting the carbon produced by your vehicles by the installation of wind turbines and the planting of tree’s etc. I urge you all to make note of these details because should any of your passengers broach the subject, particularly those from our senior clients, it is important they are made aware of the facts. And it need not stop there because should you be asked what the drivers themselves are doing apart from those things you do domestically, there are two areas that could be of benefit to you and the environment. The Chairman mentioned your credit payments being available via our website, this will be an enormous saving of paper. The other area is your tyres. I was surprised to learn that 80% of commercial airlines use remoulds. I always thought remoulds were inferior, but it appears to be quite the opposite. Apparently it takes only 7 litres of crude oil to make a remould compared to 22 litres for a new tyre. They are longer lasting and considerably cheaper… Before signing off for 2007, may I wish you all a merry Christmas and the happiest of New Years… Allen Togwell DaC Marketing allent@dialacab.co.uk

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