Lauren Hemp and Lioness success honoured with bus naming ceremony at North Walsham

Posted:

As voted for by the local community earlier in the year, we are delighted to have brought North Walsham together with a ceremonial unveiling of a bus named in Lauren Hemp's honour.

On Tuesday 5th August 2025, in partnership with North Walsham Town Council, we held a ceremonial unveiling of the name plaque adorned on one of the town's local service buses.

Sanders Coaches vehicles are named after family, long serving employees, Norfolk legends and community heroes. When we added two new single deckers to the fleet earlier in the year, we asked the local community for suggestions - Lauren Hemp came out on top!

Lauren Hemp with her family alongside her very own Sanders Coaches bus

With the Women's Euros just around the corner and confident of another success, we spoke with Lauren's family and agreed to wait until she returned to England after the tournament. Having successfully 'brought it home', we are so proud to have welcomed Lauren back to her home town of North Walsham.

Lauren cut the ribbon before being presented with a LEGO bus from us, a nod to her love of the hobby.

Lauren Hemp with (L to R) Charles Sanders (Managing Director), Rob St Pierre (North Walsham Depot Supervisor) and Kieran Smith (Operations Manager)

Charles Sanders says "I am so pleased with the turnout at North Walsham Market Place this morning. It was a real pleasure to meet Lauren and her family who were all delighted with the whole events. Our buses are named after those most worthy of the accolade and Lauren's contribution to women's football in our area is enormous. She is an inspiration to so many young girls as proven by how many queued up today for photos and autographs."

Lauren really did "Park the bus"!

The bus was chosen as it will spend its time on our local network around North Walsham including the Coasthopper CH2, 18 and X6, giving plenty of people the chance to spot the bus.

Local football fan Ethel was overjoyed to be part of the celebrations

To close the event Lauren signed the front of the bus. Her autograph will be preserved on the front of the bus alongside our logo.

What a crowd! Thank you to everybody who came to see Lauren return home