APRIL TRUCK OF THE MONTH: In a bid to acknowledge Australia’s heritage, and a nod to his late World War II serving grandfather, Luke Ashton turned his fleet green and gold as a tribute to the Anzacs. However, it’s the ‘Star’ of the show – the big Western Star 4900 B-triple – that’s attracting most attention from east to west
Green and yellow, lemon and lime, emerald and gold – no matter which way you say it they are colours synonymous with Australia. Those two colours are intrinsically linked to Australia and Australian patriotism. That patriotism is an honourable trait and in the transport industry it can be seen on many trucks. From the Australian and Indigenous flags to kangaroos or crocodiles. There is all manner of artwork representing a deep-rooted love of Australia on display.
Then you have the likes of Luke Ashton, a fully-fledged card-carrying proud Aussie that took the green and gold and splashed it all over his logos, his offices and, most importantly, his expanding Ozwide Freight fleet.
Not only has the green and gold been an integral part of the company’s aesthetics, it’s also been a part of its approach to business.
That Aussie have-a-go, get-it-done attitude has seen the family owned and operated company grow from a 12-tonne body truck to a full fleet of over 30 trucks in less than 20 years.
In the latest show of Aussie pride and passion, Ozwide has put an outstanding B-triple unit on the road that pays homage to both Luke’s familial past and this country’s history with a brilliant Anzac tribute trailer set. Exactly how did an apprentice plasterer, who’s childhood trucking passion had been ignited by garbage trucks, end up where he is today? Well, the plastering didn’t last long.
“Yeah, it was a trade I never wanted to keep pursuing,” Luke admits.
Instead, the qualified plasterer took on a job as a paperboy. No, not the pushbike with spokey dokeys kind of paperboy; it was the bulk delivery kind.
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Rebecca and Luke Ashton, founders of Ozwide Freight
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Working for Coast & Regional Transport on the Gold Coast, Luke had begun his trucking career in a little puddle jumper doing very early mornings, delivery newspapers to distributors. The newspaper deliveries soon progressed to general freight, still with Coast & Regional Transport, and saw Luke increase not just his hours, but his licences as well. From MR to HC, Luke soon ended up behind the wheel of an old Ford L9000.
With a single trailer in tow, Luke was running from the Gold Coast up into Brisbane and back and then down as far as Lismore in northern NSW.
Although Luke was enjoying the driving and the work, he decided to take an unplanned three-month break, courtesy of a sliced-open hand and surgery to repair a tendon.
Anyway, a three-month hiatus was required; that’s what the doctors recommended. Obviously coming back earlier than that could result in someone snapping the tendon again. Clearly, no one would do that, right? Luke soon got bored sitting around, went back to work early and did exactly what the doctors warned him against.
There’s no such thing as light duties in general freight. This move, however, created an opportunity for Luke. Instead of hanging out at home mastering origami or perfecting his yoga poses, he ended up in the office of Coast & Regional Transport, learning all about running a transport company while annoying the office workers.
This move turned out to be a natural fit.
“I didn’t mind it,” Luke recalls.
“Because I couldn’t physically get out and help the boys, I knew this would the next best thing.” He was right.
However, even after he healed up, Luke stayed mainly on the office side of the business.
“I did go back into a truck for about a month but then they dragged me back into the office,” he says.
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In the middle of Outback Australia ‘OZSTAR’ 4900 is a real head-turner
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This would be the new normal for Luke now. He had a grasp on how it all worked and was in his element. The role eventually saw him moving to Coffs Harbour, where he set up a new depot for the company. After two years in NSW, the lure of sandy Gold Coast beaches and the well-dressed meter maids brought Luke back to Queensland. He tried his managerial hand at a flooring company before taking on an operations role with Region Peak. It was this role that would lead him to eventually branch out on his own. Well to be more precise, it was one of the contractors that Luke dealt with in his role that kept questioning him: “Why don’t you have a go with your own truck, mate?”
It may have been the long hours he was doing or the news from his wife, Rebecca, that they were about to have their first child, or maybe just Luke’s green and gold give-it-a-go attitude, but eventually he started asking himself the same question – why don’t I have a go with my own truck?
In 2005, after a long discussion with Rebecca, they both decided to give it a go. They purchased a second hand FL7 Volvo and Ozwide Freight began.
Point of note, this wasn’t Luke’s first business. Several years earlier he had formed Ozwide Freight Consultants, a freight brokering business that Rebecca was running when Luke was still fulltime on the road. Hence the Ozwide name was carried over from that company to be the basis of the new transport company.
Appearance counts
Right from the get-go Luke was focused on not just service but also on road appearance. The second-hand truck he bought had a full repaint before hitting the road, breaking out the yellow and green stripes he’d perfected for each additional truck. Not just the truck, though – all-new colourful curtains were also fitted to the old delivery truck.
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The appearance of the Anzac tribute trailers has been greatly received by truckies and veterans alike
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With the brightly painted truck and a stack of business cards, Luke set about building relationships and finding work to keep his truck busy. From his home on the Gold Coast he established a regular run between the coast and Brisbane. It wasn’t easy but there was never a thought of whether or not it would be a success. For Luke, it was just a matter of digging in and working towards it.
“It did get to a point where I was thinking ‘this is going to take longer than I thought’,” Luke admits.
“But I had help from the likes Rob Grant at RT Logistics, who would give me some overflow.”
Other customers and contractors that Luke had formed relationships with were all willing to help out with work to keep the wheels turning.
The next few years were the hard graft for Luke; building a reliable service as well as strengthening relationships with his clients. That grafting paid off. Luke ran the FL7 himself for couple of years before the decision was made to get a second truck. That was a little five-tonner bought for a particular customer’s needs.
Wisely, Luke soon added another 12-tonne body truck, this time a UD. As the work soon filled that truck, another was needed. Within two years Luke doubled the fleet from three to six trucks.
Lessons learnt
The company’s growth has always been a well-managed plan, Luke explains.
“Even after I had one, two or three trucks, there was that many times people would promise you work and you’d go get the next truck, then nothing comes of it,” he says.
“I got to that point where, if I was going to buy another truck, it was up to me to make it work.”
This lesson meant every time he took another truck on, he would shift into the new truck, putting one of his boys into an already settled and scheduled truck, before going and building the work for the new truck.
By the time the fleet hit six body trucks, Rebecca had forgone her role at another transport company and was wearing the Ozwide shirt fulltime. Along with Rebecca coming on board the company went through the biggest change to date – it moved into its first yard.
“That was probably the catalyst for growth,” Luke explains. “Up until that point the boys were all taking their trucks home. Once we got that yard things took off.”
Luke had leased 120 square metres of a large warehouse in Brisbane’s industrial area of Rocklea. By the end of the first week Luke saw the signs ahead and had to lease the rest of the warehouse as well, giving him 1,000 square metres of warehousing and storage. That warehousing area was not just for Ozwide customers, though. All of a sudden Ozwide had been approached by several companies to act as delivery agents for Brisbane. Some mornings the boys would arrive to find four or five interstaters parked in the driveway. Ozwide’s reputation was growing as fast as its warehousing capabilities.
A year after the depot opened, Ozwide Freight purchased its first brand new truck – a 2009 eight-wheeler Iveco and pig trailer. It was a big deal for Luke and was bought to cover a regular run to Toowoomba for one of Ozwide’s major customers. That first new truck is still earning its keep in the green and gold, 13 years later.
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It’s difficult to capture the entire Ozwide team in the one spot, but here’s just a few from the office, workshop and warehouse
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Over the next four years a couple more body trucks were added. The customer base grew, therefore Luke knew he had to as well.
In 2013, he purchased a second-hand Freighter trailer and went looking for a prime mover to haul it. That was Luke’s first Western Star, a brand new 5800. The truck was bought to run as far as Toowoomba, pulling just the single as Luke was adamant he was just a local company.
“I didn’t want to do interstate, nope, never,” Luke states.
Three weeks after the Western Star did its first run to Toowoomba it was on a regular run to Melbourne. Not long after that the single trailer was reregistered and an A-trailer thrown in front, and Ozwide had its first interstate B-double.
By 2018, the company had three Western Stars doing interstate, a vast fleet of local trucks, a new yard and was getting beyond the small-medium business that Luke and Rebecca could manage on their own. It was decided that Luke would hire a manager to run the expanding company.
“It was a big thing for us to hire someone to do potentially what I should be doing myself,” Luke says. But he knew his own limitations. He was spending all day loading and unloading trucks, while trying to organise runs as well as finding time for his family.
It made sense, so Ozwide brought on board the experienced Mick Miller to run the show and help better utilise the growing fleet. At that stage the interstate work was suffering the effects of undercutting and cut-throat competitors and Luke was looking to better utilise his fleet.
“Getting Mick on board has been one of my best investments I’ve ever made,” Luke says.
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The iconic Anzac scenes caught at one of the more iconic Australian locations
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Mick’s contacts in Western Australia, combined with Luke’s contacts in North Queensland, saw the company pull out of the NSW and Victoria interstate work and concentrate on the legs that they were strongest in, growing the company for the future.
From the three interstate trucks, the company is now sending eight to 10 trailers a week to Western Australia and a dozen B-doubles and a couple of road trains into North Queensland. They have regular runs to Rockhampton, Mackay, Townsville and Cairns.
With the workload increasing so has the Ozwide fleet. Like everything with Luke, it’s all about the relationships. In 2016, Luke purchased his first Vawdry B-double unit and the relationship he started with the company, paired with the quality of its work, has seen the Vawdry name as the predominant trailer brand in the Ozwide yard. A similar relationship exists with the principal manufacturer in front of those trailers – the mighty Western Star.
There are a couple of cab-overs in the fleet, however Luke has always had a preference for a bonneted truck.
“I think the drivers prefer them,” he says. “They ride better and feel safer”.
There are also a couple of other manufacturers represented, but the Portland, Oregon-built Star has always been Luke’s preference. That comes back to relationships and service – two things Penske Australia has supplied.
Luke’s first Western Star was bought through Joey Cahill from Brisbane Truck Centre back in 2013.
“My relationship with him put me onto the first Western Star and it went on from there. I bought one off Steve Rennie in 2015, a Brisbane Truck Show truck, then I got introduced to Kurt Dein and our relationship grew from there,” he says.
A strong fleet of Ozwide Western Stars shows how much faith Luke has in his salesman and the product.
“I think the suppliers get the shits with Kurt ’cause he’s so on top of everything. He’s one salesman I never have to call to find out where things are at.”
Right from the original FL7, Luke has appreciated the importance of on-road appearance. As each new truck arrives, he ensures they look the part when they hit the road. Not just with incorporating the Australian colours into the signwriting but with added stainless, Mardi-Gras level lights and a few extra shiny bits. Like his strong relationship Kurt at Penske Australia, Luke has built a solid relationship with Brock Macdonald and the team from Rocklea Truck Electrical who are responsible for all those lights and stainless. All the linehaul trucks get fitted with RTE’s custom air system as well, a necessity when you are servicing North Queensland specialists.
Across ‘the paddock’
With all that history up to date, let’s get on to the big bonnet at the centre of all these photos – Ozwide Freight’s first 4900 Western Star. In 2019, with the rise in WA freight, Luke wanted a truck he could hook a B-triple behind and send across ‘the paddock’. Up until then, Ozwide’s Western Star fleet was comprised of mainly 4800s and 5800s. A 4900 would be a big step up.
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As well as being the fleet’s biggest, Luke wanted something to commemorate the Australian diggers. He had not long lost his grandfather, a veteran of World War Two’s Pacific campaign, so acknowledging the history and sacrifices of those in the service was extremely important to him.
Luke chose to have a dedication added to the new 4900 and then focus on using the new Vawdrey trailers as the conduit for his memorial. Designing a mural of this magnitude is a huge ask. Trying to capture so much and fit it onto the side of a truck can be challenging.
“I’ve got two brothers I grew up with, they’re part of OJO Design, they came up with it,” Luke says.
“Mark Pearce and Cameron Pearce. I put it to them and they did it all”. Knowing the truck would predominantly tow a B-triple, the design needed to be flexible enough to look good when an A trailer was removed.
Once the design was agreed to, all the information was sent off to Attards in Melbourne, which prints all of Ozwide’s colourful curtains. To me it seems like quite a task, yet to the team at Attards it’s second nature.
The big 4900 was getting prepared and prepped up at Penske Australia’s Brisbane workshop while the team at Vawdrey were working closely with Attards to put together the trailer combination. As much as Luke had wanted to keep it all under wraps it’s hard to keep something this visual quiet. So a few sneak peeks escaped.
The reaction to Ozwide’s tribute trailers has been extremely positive and extremely vocal. Photos of the unit flooded social media quicker than a COVID conspiracy theory.
“I think it’s a great tribute to our past,” Luke says.
“It’s one of those set-ups that gives you goosebumps when it drives down the road.”
Luke often gets the feedback from drivers when the trucks pull up in a small town and the local RSL empties out to grab some shots. These reactions, as well as the fact that people are talking about the Anzacs, are exactly what he wanted.
Luke admits this won’t be his last tribute trailer set either. The pride and passion he has for Australia has seen him grow from a single truck donning the Aussie green and gold to a fleet of stunning rigs that cover the country. It’s a far cry from the man who was adamant he didn’t want to do linehaul. I’m glad he got that wrong.
Photography: Warren Aitken