From: bsd(at)msg.ti.com
Subject: Alpine drought
**********
>The had the best designers in the world working for them, but they did not
>know it. ...
>The Ford Anglia is one of the best examples it was designed in the Rootes
>studios, and was shown to the Brothers who promptly told the designer it was
>no good and would not sell, they laughingly told him to take it to Fords .....
I've had some questions on the Rootes association with Singer that all this
"drought" discussion has finally motivated me to ask. Singer is where the
Rootes brothers broke into the auto industry, correct? So when did Singer
become part of the Group they later established? Did the "best designers in
the world" ever have any influence on the Singer line. I seem to remember they
tried to launch a saloon (Hunter?) in the mid-50's that was a debacle. Too
bad, especially knowing they had concepts like the Anglia floating around
elswhere in the Group. I noticed the Singer 4AD roadster was shut down about
the same time the original Alpine run ended. Coincidence? Probably so, but if
Singer was part of Rootes by '54, it sure appears someone in the Group
determined they couldn't make good businesses out of the then available
roadster lines and shut them down until the higher volume and modernized Series
Alpine design was ready. They were also 9 years into the baby boom, so I'd
think there would have been a lot of pressure to allocate capacity to good
"family barges" - was this a factor? Was it reflected in the Rootes Group
production demographics?
Regards, Bob Douglas '62 S.II
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Tue Sep 05 2000 - 09:21:09 CDT