Wolseley Motor Company - Postwar Expansion and Collapse

Postwar Expansion and Collapse

Thomas Vickers died in 1915 and Albert Vickers in 1919 both then in their eighties. During the war Wolseley's manufacturing capacity rapidly developed. Postwar the Vickers Directors decided to borrow and further expand Wolseley's works and to consolidate their motor-car interests in one company. Wolseley accordingly purchased from within the Vickers group: Electric and Ordnance Accessories Company Limited, the Motor-Car (Stellite Car) Ordnance Department and the Timken Bearing Department and announced Wolseley's future car programme would be:

1. 10 hp four-cylinder two or three-seater touring car based on the Wolseley designed Stellite car

2. 15 hp four-cylinder four-seater touring car

3. 20 hp six-cylinder chassis to be fitted with a variety of the best types of carriage-work

Examples of all these models were exhibited at the Olympia Show in November 1919.

In 1919 Wolseley also took over the Ward End, Birmingham munitions factory from Vickers and purchased a site for a new showroom and offices in London's Piccadilly by the Ritz Hotel. More than £252,000 was spent on the magnificent new building, Wolseley House, more than double their profits for 1919 when rewarding government contracts were still running. Those contracts ended. In 1920 they reported a loss of £83,000. The following years showed even greater losses and in 1924 the annual loss reached £364,000.

Ernest Hopwood had been appointed Managing Director in August 1909 following Siddeley's departure. He resigned due to ill-health late in 1919. A J McCormack who had been joint MD with Hopwood since 1911 resigned in November 1923 and was replaced by a committee of management. Then at the end of October 1926 it was disclosed Sir Gilbert Garnsey and T W Horton had been appointed joint receivers and managers and the company was bankrupt "to the tune of £2 million". It was described as "one of the most spectacular failures in the early history of the motor industry".