Meeting the road train challenge

In nearly 60 years of operation, trucking operator Marley’s Transport has seen nearly everything there is to see in the transport industry.

The company was founded in 1969 by Frank Marley in the tiny Western Australian country town of Nangeenan, which to this day houses less than 100 people.

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The Marley’s story starts with Frank’s very first truck — an old Commer which he couldn’t even drive yet, on account of being too young to earn a truck licence.

Having to bide his time, Frank took on the farmhand work that his father Tom had been doing, while Tom drove the Commer.

This is just one example of how the team at Marley’s finds solutions to their problems — something they’ve been doing since the company’s inception.

Once Frank got his licence, one truck quickly became two as he expanded the business alongside his wife Georgina. It was a sign of things to come.

Nowadays, the Marley’s fleet has expanded beyond 70 trucks. The enterprise continues to be a family-run business and one of the staples of the transport industry in WA.

It’s a long jump from just one truck carting fertiliser from the Nangeenan rail-head to local farmers.

While Marley’s may have grown, they still serves the agricultural industry through their transport work.

The Marley family and staff are now based in Perth, with ongoing expansion calling for a bigger base of operations to allow the business to continue offering the most reliable and efficient transport services possible to their customers.

The core business remains primarily in agricultural work, delivering bulk commodities including grain, fertiliser and lime. Livestock and pelletised feed transport has also become a significant part of their business, which sees Marley’s deliver to some of the biggest intensive farms in the state.

While they service several large corporate entities, they still continue to work with smaller customers alongside the farms of the Wheatbelt and other small rural businesses.