Where's that Pot of Gold?

Another welcome contribution from Omnibuses2.0's Mystery Contributor. See his post before this here

In recent months, regular readers will have noticed that this blog has featured several new industry entrants over the last few months, one of which is about will embark on its first bus service today.

Deregulation is 21 years old and there’s still enough energy among those involved in the operating industry to see these new entrants. Weston-super-Mare is one such place.

In 1985, during National Bus Company’s twilight months, it was the home to a large fleet of Ford Transit minibuses and, as a result, its local services have tended to remain fairly frequent, with many still operated by First as successor to Badgerline, with step entrance Mercedes minibuses today. Some of these buses are long-in-the-tooth 709s. There are some ex-London Dennis Dart, and a batch bought new some time ago for service 7 but, overall, the offering from First is perhaps not the most attractive.

So, is that the reason why two ‘new starts’—Inonespin and ACL—have recently commenced operations based in Weston? Surely Bristol (just 20 miles up the road) or Bath offer better prospect of a commercial return. Both of those cities have localised competition—but it is from established Alan Peters’s ABus and John Pickford’s Faresaver, both of which can now be considered as much a part of the scene on their own patches as First. But that’s really all.

ACL tried competing on the long Weston–Bristol corridor last summer but wasn’t able to commit enough resources to trouble First, so has returned to pure town services in Weston. Likewise, Inonespin operates a one duty, one bus town service in Weston on Mondays to Saturdays, with the addition of a Friday and Saturday night (2000 to 0430) Weston–Bristol service.

Can we conclude that medium sized towns, where a bigger impact can be made with fewer buses, offer better prospects for entrepreneurial bus operators than the big cities? The incumbents in bigger cities offer high frequencies, and saturated radials where services combine to enter city centres. Does this make it more difficult for new starts, such as Brighton’s The Big Lemon? Or are there more complex reasons?