Badger Vectis Badger Vectis Badger Vectis was an English bus company based in Poole. A post-deregulation joint venture between Weston-super-Mare based bus company Badgerline and Isle of Wight bus company Southern Vectis, it was set up in September 1987 to compete with incumbent operator Wilts & Dorset. The buses all used the Badgerline brand. After a noted bus war between the two large companies, Badger Vectis folded in March 1988. Badger Vectis was formed in September 1987 as an joint venture between Badgerline (80%) and Southern Vectis (20%), after both recently privatised bus companies had failed in a joint bid earlier in
Southern Vectis scrap their car. Southern Vectis announced that five vehicles had been scrapped within the first fortnight of the promotion and it had received around 6,000 enquiries. As a result of deregulation in 1986, several competitors started and others increased existing services. These competitors included Gange's Minicoaches, Grand Hotel Tours, Island Travel (Cooke's Coaches of Porchfield), Moss Motor Tours, Seaview Services' RedLynx and Wiltax of Shanklin. Island Travel and Gange's Minicoaches established routes between Cowes and Ryde. The newly privatised Southern Vectis responded with a number of new business practices. These practices raised the interest of the Office of Fair Trading