In 2005 New Zealand Truck & Driver profiled a fleet that had the distinction of having been incorporated as a charitable trust.

Tinwald-based Wilson Bulk Transport had been set up in the 1960s by local farmer Trevor Wilson and his brother, primarily to handle bulk grain harvested by their agricultural contracting business from farms in the mid-Canterbury area.

After the partnership was dissolved in the late 1960s, Trevor carried on as sole owner, adding fertiliser spreading and stock cartage to the services he offered his rural clients. He was also deeply involved in community activities, and after being diagnosed with terminal cancer in 1990, he made the radical call to set up the company as a charitable trust with its operating profits being directed to two beneficiaries, the Order of St John and Presbyterian Social Services.

Trevor died a year later, and the trust continued under the chairmanship of long-time friend Philip Wareing, who also superintended the operation of the transport company. Over the next 20-plus years, Wilson Bulk Transport grew from the seven trucks it had in 1991 to in excess of 30 units and their associated trailers.

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