SOANS – A FAMILY BUSINESS – The Move to Leamington.

So in 1927 Grandad had a cheque in the Bank, enjoyed being a Ford Main Dealer and was undoubtedly good at his job. He therefore approached Ford to see if there were opportunities for a new Main Dealer anywhere in the country. It turned out that at that time Hastings, High Wycombe, Wembley & Leamington Spa were in need of a Ford Main Dealer.

This is where Great Grandma Elizabeth comes in. Her family, the Lines, came from Napton, just up the road, and her links to this area, coupled with a favourable report on the town from another great-uncle, Ernest, who was working in Birmingham in those days, made Leamington the favoured location . Back in 1919 when Soans & Dunn signed up to the new ‘exclusive’ agreement, Ford required all their Main Dealers to become “solus” – that is not to represent any other motor manufacturers.  Midland Autocar in Leamington had been Ford Agents since 1912, but also represented a number of other companies including Rover and Standard, both manufactured locally, and were loath to give them all up in favour of Ford. A compromise was reached whereby Midland Autocar opened separate Ford premises on the Parade, close to their main Russell Street garage, until a full Main Ford Dealer could be appointed.

Agreement was reached for Grandad & his son, Fred, now trading as C. H. Soans & Son, to take on thelease of a shop at 34 Parade, and become the Ford Main dealer for much of central and south Warwickshire, but excluding Coventry, where a main dealer had previously been appointed. Behind 34 Parade was a narrow workshop running through to Tavistock Street, and there was a lock-up in Tavistock Street holding 4 or 5 cars. Both the workshops had cobbled floors so had probably been stables in earlier times. (McDonalds now stands on the site of the shop) Grandad & Fred opened for business on May 1st. 1928, and at the start business was tough. Model T production had finally ended the year before, having been in production for 18 years since 1909, with over 16.5 million built world-wide. The more refined replacement, the Model A, appealed to a smaller section of the market. Midland Autocar customers naturally remained loyal to that company and the existing Ford dealer in Coventry did not welcome fresh competition. Nobody in the town even knew who these new southern garage people were! Meanwhile the Country was heading for the Great Depression, and the Wall Street crash was looming.  Gradually however, C H Soans & Son made progress, and five years later, in 1933, as the lease on the Parade shop was coming to an end, a move to more suitable premises became essential This led to the purchase of the old roller skating rink in Dormer Place, from the big engineering company GEC.  During the First World War the rink had been used by the Standard Motor Company as sub-contractors to Sopwith, to manufacture aircraft wings, with the linen covering being applied & doped in near-by Victoria Park.  

The premises were far larger than the Parade shop and their purchase, together with the costs of adaptation from its industrial past and building a new frontage, large showroom, office and workshop facilities doubtless represented a significant financial risk for the young company. The building was finally demolished in 1990 to accommodate a large office block overlooking the Regal Cinema.

As business continued to increase as the economy gradually recovered after the Depression, the larger premises confirmed the wisdom of the move, allowing Soans to expand to meet the growing demand, as the Ford car range grew to include models from the £100 Popular to large V8-engined saloons.

At the outbreak of war in 1939, the business was turned over to reconditioning military vehicles for the Ministry of Defence. They were generally collected from the large army depot at Ashchurch near Tewkesbury, close to the present-day M5 junction. Just collecting the vehicles from the depot and getting them back to Leamington often took a full day as conditions there were chaotic. Most were War Office Transport 1 or 2 (WOT1 or WOT2) trucks and were Ford built. The showroom area was requisitioned for Rotheram & Sons, makers of precision instruments, who had been bombed out of their Coventry premises in the Blitz. The two distinctive towers at each end of the building were used for ARP fire-watching duties each night.

When the war ended, production of new cars was severely limited by the shortage of steel and raw materials and the need to export, so domestic car sales involved a lengthy waiting list. Used cars gradually became more available, so the workshop became ever busier maintaining and repairing the many ageing vehicles still in use.  Commercial vehicles were more important than cars for private motoring – here’s an example of vehicles that were supplied during that post war period to local companies.

When Grandad Charles died in 1950 Fred, my dad, became Managing Director of the growing business. After a while Ford wanted increased representation in Stratford on Avon to match its growing importance as a tourist attraction. Stratford was part of our “territory”, but eventually, agreement was reached with the Titchmarsh family for them to open Arden Garages as a new Main Dealer, with Dad as a significant shareholder to provide continuity & expertise. Arden developed in to a successful dealership and Dad later sold his shareholding to the Titchmarsh family, where in turn three generations of that family have worked in their business.

As life finally returned to normal the Dormer Place premises became increasingly congested. Parking in nearby streets became ever more difficult. So some storage premises were bought in Trinity Street, Leamington, but it quickly became clear that further premises would soon be needed.

In due course, we acquired Westrock, a large house garden and assorted outbuildings situated opposite the Fire Station on Warwick Street between Grove Street and the Dell, from the estate of Granville Gulliman, a very inventive local character.  Eventually a small workshop was built in Grove St. which relieved some of the pressure at the Dormer Place site. In 1961 there was a further development: I appeared on the scene. Most family businesses seem to have a life of three generations. I was that third generation. I had had a 5-year engineering apprenticeship at Jaguar Cars, a major manufacturer of high performance sporting and luxury cars, so life at a quite small family garage (with fewer than thirty employees) required quite an adjustment for a “Jack the Lad” who knew it all and the transition was not particularly smooth. I was however given business training by Ford to learn their methods, at their Training Centre in Detroit where American garage design certainly influenced future thinking.

It soon became clear that the new Westrock site would not be suitable for development as a modern Ford dealership. The frontage on to the main road was on a significant slope, there was limited parking, poor access and it was surrounded for the most part by residential housing. It was therefore sold for development to Blackburns, the Coventry builders. – Kwik Fit is based in part of it nowadays.

 Richard Soans

October 2014

Images from my private collection, edited by Allan Jennings.

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Read the Other Chapters:-
The Early Years (1);
The Move to Sydenham (3);
Life After Ford (4)