The Rootes Group was a British automobile manufacturer and, separately, a major motor distributors and dealers business. From headquarters in the West End of London, the manufacturer was based in the Midlands and the distribution and dealers business in the south of England.

In the decade 1928-38, brothers William and Reginald Rootes, made prosperous by their very successful motor car distribution and servicing business, were keen to enter manufacturing for closer control of the products they were selling. With the financial support of Prudential Assurance, the two brothers bought many well-known British motor manufacturers—including Hillman, Humber, Singer, Sunbeam, Talbot, Commer and Karrier. At its height in 1960, Rootes Group had manufacturing plants in the Midlands at Coventry and Birmingham, in southern England at Acton, Luton and Dunstable, and a brand-new plant in the west of Scotland at Linwood. From its offices in Devonshire House on Piccadilly in central London, it controlled exports and international distribution for Rootes and other motor manufacturers, as well as its own local distribution and service operations in London, Kent, Birmingham and Manchester. There were assembly plants in nine countries outside the UK.

Rootes Group was under-capitalised in its last years and unable to survive industrial relations problems at its facilities and losses from the 1963 introduction of a new aluminium-engined small car, the Hillman Imp. By mutual agreement, from mid-1964, Rootes Motors was taken over in stages by US auto company Chrysler; it acquired control from the Rootes family by 1967 and refashioned the group as Chrysler United Kingdom. By the end of 1978, the last of the various elements of Chrysler UK had been resold to French automotive group Peugeot SA, which itself subsequently merged with Chrysler to form Stellantis.

History

Dealer and distributor for other manufacturers

thumb|Founder [[William Rootes, 1st Baron Rootes|William Rootes]]

Rootes was founded in Hawkhurst, Kent, in 1913 by William Rootes as a car sales agency independent from his father's Hawkhurst motor business. Rootes had moved his operations to Maidstone by 1914 and there he contracted to repair aero engines. In 1917 he formed Rootes Limited to buy the Maidstone branch of his father's motor business, founded by his father in 1897, to expand his aircraft engine repair business and the manufacture of aircraft parts.

In 1919 the distribution of cars and commercial vehicles resumed and operations extended to London and other part of the country. As early as 1924 Rootes had become the largest truck and car distributor in the United Kingdom. They advertised that their showrooms in Devonshire House, Piccadilly could supply new cars priced from £145 to £3,000 manufactured by Rolls-Royce, Daimler, Sunbeam, Austin, Hillman, Fiat or Clyno.

Humber Limited

thumb| [[Hillman 14]]

thumb|Humber 16–60

A particular effort was put into overseas sales and it became clear the export opportunities warranted a move into car manufacture, which was achieved in 1929 by the purchase of controlling interests in first Hillman followed by Humber and Commer.

Rootes Securities Limited

Rootes Limited was renamed Rootes Securities Limited in 1933. During the Depression more businesses were picked up as they came available: Karrier (1934), Sunbeam (1934), Clement Talbot (1934) and British Light Steel Pressings (1937) were all bought and made subsidiaries of Humber Limited. London's Mayfair coachbuilders and Rolls-Royce and Daimler dealers Thrupp & Maberly had been bought in 1926

Ownership and control, Rootes family

Rootes Motors Limited was the new name assumed 16 November 1949 of holding company Rootes Securities Limited. Substantially the whole of 1917's initial capital had been provided by the two Rootes brothers. Thereafter the business's expansion was financed by retained profits supplemented where necessary, for example the purchase of Hillman, by loans from Prudential and the company's bankers principally Midland Bank. On 24 November 1949 shares in Rootes Motors Limited were issued to the public in exchange for £3,025,000. Rootes was now a public company and the new capital repaid the Prudential and Midland Bank loans. The listed shares however were preference shares. The equity capital remained in the hands of the Rootes family now with new partner Prudential who had taken up all of the offered £1,000,000 of ordinary shares. In addition there were external shareholdings in the Rootes Acceptances vehicle exporting business and in Automobile Products of India.

At this time employees totalled 17,000. Rootes owned, on average, about 80 per cent of the capital of its subsidiaries. The manufacturing subsidiaries were held through partly owned Humber Limited. Manufacture was carried out in three factories in Coventry with more at Luton, Cricklewood and Acton. There was a wholly owned assembly plant in Australia and similar facilities owned with associates in Argentina, Republic of Ireland and India. From Devonshire House in Piccadilly the original business, the marketing subsidiary, directed operations at five branches in Kent, their North Kensington service department and Birmingham and Manchester branches together with distribution companies overseas sometimes jointly owned. Further issues of preference shares and debenture stock followed in November 1954 and November 1959. Rootes Acceptances Limited, the export financing arm, was sold.

World War II

thumb|A [[Bristol Blenheim bomber]]

With the outbreak of World War II, Rootes, like most other British car manufacturers, became involved with the production of armaments. In 1940, under the Government's shadow factory scheme, Rootes built its massive assembly plant in Ryton-on-Dunsmore, near Coventry, initially manufacturing aircraft, one of the first types being the Bristol Blenheim. Production included a Royal Air Force heavy bomber, the Handley Page Halifax. These were built at a shadow factory at Speke Airport near Liverpool and at Blythe Bridge in Staffordshire from 1941 to 1943. Rootes also manufactured military vehicles, based on the Humber and Commer.

Rootes had a rare lapse of business judgement shortly after World War II. When he visited the Volkswagen factory in Wolfsburg to evaluate it for war reparations, he opined that it – and the Beetle – had no value.

Postwar acquisitions

Tilling-Stevens with its subsidiary Vulcan Motors, both old-established and well-known commercial vehicle and bus manufacturers, was bought in the second half of 1950. Rootes' Singers, badge-engineered Hillmans, were aimed at slightly more upmarket small car buyers.

Post-war development

thumb|Hillman Minx Series IIIC

Following the war, Rootes also sponsored satellite manufacturing operations around the world, notably in Australasia (Rootes Australia) and the Middle East. The best known example of the latter was the Iranian-built Paykan, based on the Hillman Hunter. In 1950 it acquired Tilling-Stevens, a truck and bus manufacturer based in Maidstone, Kent.

Rootes successfully sold a range of cars priced at a slight premium to their major home market competitors, justified on the basis that they offered a level of superiority in design and finish.

Studebaker stylist Raymond Loewy was a design consultant to Rootes; evidence of his influence is most readily seen in the 1956 Audax range of cars, which included the contemporary Hillman Minx, a model also produced under licence by Isuzu of Japan as the Isuzu Hillman Minx.

Engineering innovation

Rootes introduced a novel supercharged diesel engine in 1954, based on a Sulzer Brothers concept. This was the Commer TS3 2-stroke 3-cylinder engine, with 2 opposed inward facing pistons per cylinder, which drove the crankshaft through bell cranks. The 3.25 litre engine developed , equivalent to contemporary 4-stroke diesel engines of more than twice the capacity.

The engine was used in Commer trucks as well as an industrial engine. Production ceased in 1968 after the Chrysler takeover.

Range rationalisation

thumb|Rootes Group logo after Chrysler takeover. This logo was used until June 1970, when Rootes was replaced by Chrysler

thumb|[[Hillman Minx Magnificent, 1937]]

Hillman when purchased had been making large cars. They introduced a straight-eight soon after Hillman became a subsidiary, but it was withdrawn as the Depression deepened. Their 2-1/2 and 3-litre cars were re-styled in the mid-1930s and renamed Humber Snipe and their small Minx was made the mainstay bread and butter member of the Rootes range. Sunbeam continued its sports appeal but downsizing postwar to small to medium-sized cars. Humber made the larger luxury passenger vehicles, Snipes and variants, and luxury mid-size cars ending with the compact Sceptre. The intervening break in medium-sized Humbers was filled by the postwar Sunbeams. Commer and Karrier were the commercial vehicle brands. Commer manufactured a full range of vans, trucks, tractors and bus chassis, and some badge-engineered small vehicles from the Hillman range. Karrier represented mainly municipal and special-purpose trucks, vans and buses, though towards the end included badge-engineered models from the Commer range.

Sunbeam Tiger

During the 1960s, Sunbeam's Alpine convertible was moderately successful in the US market. Rootes considered that the Alpine's sales would be improved with a more powerful model. As a result, in 1964 they introduced the Tiger, a V8 derivative powered by a Ford V8 engine. Carroll Shelby was involved in the development of the Tiger prototype.

A model followed in 1967, but few were built as it was considered inappropriate for a Chrysler vehicle to be powered by Ford. Consideration was given to installing a Chrysler V8 in the Tiger, but their engines were larger and heavier than the Ford engines, and the rear-mounted distributor would have required an unaffordable chassis design, given the limited sales.

Hillman Imp and the move to Linwood

thumb|The rear-engine [[Hillman Imp never caught on with the buying public.]]

In 1963, Rootes introduced the Hillman Imp, a compact rear-engined saloon with an innovative all-aluminium OHC engine, based on a Coventry Climax engine design (originally used for a fire pump). It was intended to be a response from Rootes to rival British Motor Corporation's popular Mini, and a new factory (called the Linwood plant) on the boundary between Paisley and Elderslie, Renfrewshire was built for its assembly. The move to Linwood was forced upon the company by the British government, which had introduced the principle of industrial development certificates (IDCs) to build factories in depressed areas. The Linwood workforce had no experience in motor vehicle assembly and the build quality and reliability of the cars suffered. Another problem was that the component suppliers were still based in the Midlands, and the company incurred costs transporting half-finished engine castings from Linwood to be machined at Ryton and returned to Linwood once they had been assembled. Completed Imps returned south to Ryton, resulting in a round trip.

The Imp itself was underdeveloped, and the build quality and reliability problems, coupled with buyer apathy towards the design were reflected in poor sales. After a reasonably successful start in 1963–65, the Imp did not sell well. Lost production caused by frequent strike action at Linwood and escalating warranty claims left Rootes no money to develop other models.

Competition history

thumb|A [[Sunbeam-Talbot 90 won the Monte Carlo Rally in 1955]]

During the 1950s, Rootes's promotion included a strategy of participation in major UK and European car rallies. Stirling Moss and Sheila van Damm were their top drivers, and the Sunbeam-Talbot 90's win in the 1955 Monte Carlo Rally was the most significant victory.

In 1968, Rootes entered a factory team in the London-Sydney Marathon. Driving a Hillman Hunter, Andrew Cowan gained what was regarded as a surprise victory against stiff competition from other factory teams with bigger budgets.

Business strategy

William Rootes' particular business skills were in marketing. Rootes brothers' manufacturing business was best known for solid, dependable, well-engineered middle-market vehicles always of attractive appearance. Well-known Rootes models include the Hillman Minx, its successor the Hillman Hunter, the Humber Super Snipe and the Sunbeam Alpine.

William Rootes built the Rootes Group using specific brands for each market niche.

Management succession

Following the death in 1964 of Lord Rootes, his son, William Geoffrey Rootes, became the second Lord Rootes and became the new chairman of Rootes Motors. On 1 May 1967 Lord Rootes appointed Gilbert Hunt, a Wolverhampton-born business executive, who at the time was managing director of Massey Ferguson in the UK, to be the new managing director of the Rootes Group. Hunt's appointment was made with the support of Chrysler, which was building its holding and control over the business during this period.

Rootes' successors

Chrysler (1967–1978)

In June 1964 Rootes Motors announced Chrysler would take a 30 per cent interest in their ordinary capital offering current shareholders double the market price and a 50 per cent share in the non-voting preference capital for almost three times market price. The purchase would leave control in British hands. On completion Rootes family holdings would still exceed those of Chrysler. The purchase was completed in October 1964. During 1966 the holdings were increased to 45 per cent of the ordinary shares and 65 per cent of the non-voting shares and in January 1967 holdings were increased to about two-thirds of Rootes Motors capital. It was renamed Chrysler UK on 30 June 1970.

It has been suggested that the demise of Rootes began with losses due to industrial relations problems at their BLSP plant in London, with knock-on problems down the supply chain. By the mid-1960s, Rootes was progressively taken over by Chrysler of the United States, following huge losses amid the commercial failure of the troubled Imp. The company's financial year ran to 31 July, and in the year ended 31 July 1967 Rootes was able to report a pre-tax profit of just £3.8 million. It was the first reported profit since 1964 and compared with a pretax loss of £10.7 million in the year ending in 1966. On 1 January 2007, in line with the other 40 dealerships within its business group, the name was changed from Rootes Maidstone, to Robins & Day Maidstone. Robins & Day is wholly owned and operated by Peugeot UK, as opposed to many car dealerships which are franchises. As of April 2020 it is being converted into luxury penthouses and will be completed in 2024.

Rootes' contribution to Coventry's history is commemorated by the University of Warwick in the naming of Rootes Hall, one of its largest halls of residence, on the main campus site on the outskirts of Coventry.

The name lives on in the short access to the Rootes Estate, a housing estate built in the early 1990s on most of the Ladbroke Grove site of the Clément-Talbot car factory. The main access to the redevelopment, Shrewsbury Street, is named after the founder of Clément-Talbot, Charles Chetwynd-Talbot, 20th Earl of Shrewsbury. Soon after the Second World War the group of Clément-Talbot factory buildings was converted to a Rootes Group London administration and service depot which was later bought by Warwick Wright. One of the original buildings remains, the Talbot administration block now known as Ladbroke Hall, with the earl's crest high above its main entrance. A tenant, Sunbeam studios, is named after the Sunbeam-Talbot car briefly produced there from 1938 to 1939 and 1945 to 1946. In the housing area there are short links one named Humber Drive and a Hillman Drive each side of a small park and there is a Sunbeam Crescent.

Notes

References

  • Rootes Archive Centre (archived, 29 Oct 2005)