The sales team of English transport group Europa Road in Ostend has recently been led by Jack Baxter. He has worked for Europa Road for seven years and is now putting his UK brexit experience at the service of Belgian importers and exporters.
Since last year, the global Europa Worldwide Group has been firmly engaged in building its road transport network based in Ostend. From its headquarters in England, it invested in additional rolling stock and expanded its workforce to 47 people. The Ostend branch was renamed from Continental Cargo Carries to Europa Road Belgium in September 2022. The focus is on full load, part load and groupage transport in both directions between the United Kingdom (UK) and continental Europe.
As part of the reorganisation for further growth, eight new positions were created in the sales team. In the process, two people were promoted. Frank Goes (pictured centre back), who has worked for the company in Ostend for 25 years, is now responsible for customer service. As the new head of the four account managers (sales), Jack Baxter (pictured back right) came over from England.
Born into the company
Baxter has worked full-time for Europa Road for three years (previously four years part-time/as a student) and was branch manager of the Leeds branch. “I was helping importers and exporters from Yorkshire through brexit. Now that I have been transferred to Ostend, I will do the same for customers based in Belgium. My experience on the UK side will help optimise their flows of goods between the UK and the EU.”
The young Englishman, who turns 24 next month, was born into the company. “I am the son of Europe Worldwide Group CEO Andrew Baxter. Because I did holiday jobs in the company from the age of 14 and stepped straight from school into work, I gained a lot of experience.”
Different culture
Since last summer, Baxter has been staying in Ostend and he likes it here. “I grew up in Newark in the heart of England and longed to live on a coast for once. Getting to know another culture is very enriching, everyone should do that once in their life. It is wonderful to visit cities like Ostend, Bruges, Ghent, Brussels and also the Ardennes.”
More people on the way
The expansion to 47 employees was almost a doubling and the company plans to recruit more people in the coming months. “More specifically, we are going to introduce market managers in strategic hub locations,” says Carlo Turner, non-network & continent director of Europa Road Belgium.
“We continue to invest. Today, our Belgian fleet numbers more than four hundred trailers and we are the third largest trailer operator from Zeebrugge. In 2022, we achieved a turnover of 24 million euros.”
