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company’s in-house freight software, Exportease, a new website, SEO development, and extensive work with Google to attract new enquiries. Jenna has also completed her Chartered


Institute of Marketing diploma while working for Wallis and has been involved in applying for Brexit grants to train staff. Plus, in line with Wallis’s customer-centric approach, Jenna has created training events for new exporters and set up a consultancy service for clients. Part of the value of training, she feels, is that


it brings new ideas into a business and often reveals areas of potential – like exhibition logistics services, which Wallis has introduced during the past year. “I am an ideas person,” Jenna affirmed. “I do


Jenna (right) at golf day organised for Wallis staff


Implementing ideas


The need for ‘new blood’ is a well-discussed topic in freight forwarding. Jenna Morgan, winner of the 2019 BIFA Young Freight Forwarder award, fits that category perfectly, having brought a fresh perspective to her family’s business


Jenna Morgan is not new to Wallis Shipping Services, which her parents founded in 1987. She grew up learning about profit and loss accounts, stowage plans and remote places, and used to help with clerical work at weekends. She said: “I was encouraged to join Wallis


when I was younger, and I resisted it because I did not want anyone to assume I would take the ‘easy’ route. But my parents were supportive of me doing my own thing.”


Education Jenna studied marketing at Bournemouth University and then completed a BA (Hons) in Multimedia Journalism, before starting work at a marketing agency – where she realised the same strategies she was using to help her clients could be applied closer to home. As Wallis’ sales and marketing manager, she


is now able to combine her lifelong experience of freight forwarding with her knowledge of marketing to take the company forward. “I think what I would like to bring to the business is an understanding of what freight


March 2020


forwarding was, and what it can become in the future,” she considered. “Working with marketing agencies involves clients from a broad spectrum of industries, so I gathered ideas that I have now been able to implement in the context of Wallis.” Examples, so far, include promoting the


not like to be in a workplace where you cannot speak up and I would hate for anyone I work with to feel like they have to sit on an idea. So we have implemented ‘Idea of the Month’ to encourage everyone to make suggestions.”


To-do list Jenna now has a three-year-old daughter of her own and, at the time of writing, she was expecting her second child. While balancing work and a young family is certainly “a juggle”, she noted that Wallis is very supportive of working parents and she remains as ambitious as ever. In the future, she wants to do an advanced


course in exporting or an MBA – and she has more ideas for Wallis, too. “We already have an office near Heathrow,


and about 30% of our work is now in air freight, so registering with the International Air Transport Association will be a logical step for us. “Also, I am aware that 3% of global CO2


emissions are caused by shipping; it is not the eco-friendliest industry. So one of the things on my ‘maternity to-do list’ is to research carbon- offsetting schemes so that we can offer this as part of our quotations,” she added. Plus, Jenna feels there is still progress to be


made in encouraging women to work in freight forwarding. She believes there is scope for a female freight forwarder network along the lines of BIFA’s Young Forwarder Network. Indeed: “I would like to set up a ‘Females in


Freight’ group where women could share ideas about their work, training, resources and other issues,” she said. “There have always been more men in this


Jenna with her parents, Sue and Stuart Gregory who co-founded Wallis Shipping Services, at the BIFA Awards


industry, but at Wallis we have actually reversed this. We have more female freight forwarders – and more young female freight forwarders in particular, which is encouraging.” Jenna is certainly a dynamic example in that


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