‘OFF-MARKET’ PROPERTY DEAL BRINGS SUCCESSFUL COACH COMPANY TO NORWICH

A leading Norfolk coach company is set to open a Norwich depot, following an off-market deal to buy a site on Bessemer Road in the south of the city.

Holt-based Sanders Coaches has bought the 0.65 acre site, which includes a 10,000 sq ft building, after a long search for suitable premises, and with the help of Norwich-based property services firm Arnolds Keys.

“A Norwich depot is a key part of making our operations more efficient, and enabling us to expand – but we were finding it difficult to find the right site,” said Charles Sanders, managing director of Sanders Coaches.

“We knew we wanted to buy the property freehold so that we could fit it out for our exact requirements, and we had been trawling the market for some time without success.”

The new depot, previously a warehouse for Sheffield Insulations, was identified as a possible property by Guy Gowing of Arnolds Keys.  Although the site was not on the market, he approached the owners, a regional property company, to propose a sale.

“There is huge demand for freehold commercial property at the moment, and very limited supply,” said Mr Gowing.  “Increasingly finding suitable property is a question of having an in-depth, insider knowledge of the local market, and the right contacts to make deals happen.”

Sanders Coaches was formed in 1975 by Charles Sanders’ parents Norman and Gladys Sanders, and now boasts a fleet of over 90 vehicles.  The firm employs more than 120 people in Norfolk.

Arnolds Keys was named the county’s top commercial property deal-maker by leading industry publication EGI (Estates Gazette) in its most recent survey – the second year in a row that the firm has topped the ‘deals done’ league.