[Healeys] Donald Healey's retail business

[Patrick and Caroline Quinn]

G'day Gary

My best wishes for a safe and joyous festive season to everyone.

Back in 1975 Alan Jones and I visited the Donald Healey Motor Company that
was then located in the converted cinema in Warwick and my memory tells me
that it was a BMC agency.

Hoo Roo

Patrick Quinn
Sydney, Australia

-----Original Message-----
From: healeys-bounces at autox.team.net [mailto:healeys-bounces at autox.team.net]
On Behalf Of Editorgary at aol.com
Sent: Friday, 25 December 2009 11:25 PM
To: healeys at autox.team.net
Subject: Re: [Healeys] Donald Healey's retail business

In a message dated 12/24/09 5:48:51 PM, healeys-request at autox.team.net 
writes:


> 
> Gary, my understanding has been that the special arrangement enjoyed by 
> the
> Donald Healey Motor Company with BMC (that gave DMH exclusive rights to
> market the cars to U.S. forces in the UK) applied only to Austin-Healeys.
> Do you (or anyone else) know if that is so or not?
> 

No exhaustive research here, but five minutes with Donald Healey/Peter 
Garnier My World of Cars found this (p. 109):
Part of the Austin deal was that we should have the sale conscession in the 
UK for Austin-Healey cars, that we alone should sell the first batch. As 
well as the small showroom-cum-drawing office we built at The Cape, we
opened 
a showroom at the Austin servce Centre in West London. There was so much 
pressure from the big Austin distributors, however, that Austin finally 
persuaded us to allow the Austin-Healey to go out through their normal
Austin 
outlets, in return for which they gave us an Austin franchise. My son Brian
took 
over the retail side." (emphasis mine)
The period he's referring to, of course, is 1952-1954. So from the very 
beginning of the Austin-Healey relationship, Donald Healey Motor Company had
an 
Austin franchise, which would very soon have become a BMC franchise.
I didn't search other books, but I know I can find a picture from later on, 
of the converted movie theatre in Warwick which DHMCo acquired as their 
retail showroom when they expanded beyond The Cape.
I'm sure other people on this list can confirm that the Healey family had a 
BMC franchise. 
Gary