F. G. BOND & SON
History
Old and new at Shepton Mallett Truckfest July 2011
F G Bond & Son is a family haulage and vehicle repair business serving the local community and far beyond. The Company was started in 1934 by the late Mr F G Bond and Mrs B V J Bond. Mr Bond would haul materials using a car and trailer. During the years of the 2nd World War, Mr Bond had a contract to haul cakes and bakery products from Bristol to the NAAFI Headquarters at Charmy Down and RAF Colerne, near Bath.
In 1944 he bought Marshfield Garage, with one petrol pump, a house and garage buildings, all in desperate need of repair. The first tipper lorry was bought in 1945, a Bedford, for hauling materials around for local builders. The following year another lorry was purchased, this lorry hauled cakes from Bath to Marshfield for the local baker and for Sainsbury’s Mill at Wick, near Bristol.
The business continued to carry on general haulage until the arrival of a Commer lorry, which was the first lorry to go on permanent haulage for Wick quarry in 1947. The first Dodge lorry, for which the company were renowned for collecting, arrived in 1950 and over the years the Dodge & Renault lorries had increased to thirteen, with two new ERF’s joining the fleet later.
Mr Rodney Bond joined his father in 1966, to run the garage and service the lorries, while his Father continued to drive. In 1977 the large yard at Marshfield was used to build new workshops for repairing cars and lorries. This left his Mrs Bond free to cope with the extra book work until her death in 1982 .
The tippers are painted in the livery of red and green and have aluminium insulated bodies. They are maintained on a strict rota system, serviced every six weeks, cleaned almost daily. Besides working for Cemex in Wickwar and Hanson Chipping Sodbury and Tytherington, they also run their own aggregate supplies, which are ordered for delivery direct to the customer across the country.
The late 1980’s saw the company enter Truckfest, Shepton Mallett for the first time where they caught the ‘Bug’ for competitions. Since then F.G Bond are never far away from a prize. Over the years they have won numerous awards including Best Kept Fleet, Best Kept Working Truck, Best Kept Tipper to name but a few. To date the company can boast over 100 individual awards for their fleet, something they are rightly very proud of.
Edward the third generation joined the business full time in 1990 driving a small 7.5 tonne Dodge tipper. During early 1991 the business acquired a new ERF lorry and increased the number of ERF's on the fleet over the next 10 years. The change of the century saw yet more additions to the fleet including Scania, MAN and more recently new DAF, Foden and Volvo all painted in their award winning red and green livery.
A dable in trying out work hauling concrete floor beams led to the purchase of a Scania flat bed fitted with a hiab crane almost a decade ago. Currently the company is running five such vehicles, the lastest two to join the fleet are Volvo FH12.
The company is renowed for its friendly and personal service but also for its "clean and green" image!