The Quicks Journey
Take a trip down memory lane with us and have a look how
Quicks was born, it's a pretty exciting story. Promise.
Quicks is Born
Way way back when in 1912 the brothers set up
the business with Harry bringing his 5 years experience as an
apprentice to the table. With Harry’s experience and Jim’s
enthusiasm to find a different way of selling cars it was a
business plan that was sure to take off.
You wouldn’t believe it but Quicks was stared
in a garage in Old Trafford,Manchester which surprisingly still
stands today, from this garage they ran a successful taxi and
repair service and built up a rather large taxi fleet.
Moving Forward With Ford
The brothers saw the business through the
slump of World War One and once again came out on top and made a
profit that year, in the same year started their association with
the Ford Motor Company.
Following their partnership with Ford in March
1914 they saw a dramatic rise in business. Ford was just as popular
then as it is now obviously.
Off the back of this success the brothers
acquired a new site on Chester Road, and in the same year became
the main distributor of Ford vehicles (not bad for two brothers
from up north). The business was moving fast but the brothers
managed to keep their northern feet on the ground.
Taxi please
The company was made a private limited company
in 1919 and in 1921 the brothers came to an agreement to sell their
beloved taxi fleet and invest all their time in the motor trade
(wise move we think)
The new main premises on Chester Road,
Manchester had allowed the brothers to expand the showroom and buy
a spanking new machine wash and soap and petrol pump (a fancy piece
of kit for those times). Then the brothers started moving up in the
world and in 1922 came the first Quicks paint shop and body
shop.
After the war the business continued to thrive
and saw record high profits. The business continued it’s
strong partnership with Ford and sold a number of it’s iconic
models including the Model T (the car of it’s day) and the Model
A.
The only way is up
With the success of the business the brothers
could afford to flash the cash and add to their property portfolio,
adding Peter Street to their array of stores in 1925, followed by
Bury in 1928 and Altrincham and Cheadle in the 1930’s.
In the 1930’s they settled for a site just a
stones throw from their home town on Deansgate which thrived
throughout the 1930’s and subsequently was given a face lift in
1959.
The 1940’s and 50’s saw steady and continued
growth for the business with a number of new premises been bought
throughout the years, one of them being the Old Brewery on George
Street in 1958. The site was converted into a modern and state of
the art workshop.
Getting bigger and bigger
Continued growth in the 1960’s enabled the
Quicks brothers to open its Truck Division in 1972 on the 5 ½ acre
site in Trafford Park. The following year saw the brothers expand
their business away from their northern roots and opened showrooms
in Mansfield and Chesterfield.
In the late seventies the brothers again had
to buy a bigger site to accommodate their ever expanding business,
this was to be a £1 million service facility at Derby Street,
Manchester.
1979 saw the launch of Quicks central parts
warehouse Quickco, the brothers really had the business bug.
Here we are today
Quicks continued to prosper through the 90’s
and in 2004 was snapped up by Pendragon PLC.
Quicks now offers car buying the way it should
be, exactly the way the brothers would of wanted, offering a
personalised service to all it’s customers and making car buying as
simple as possible.
The Quicks concept puts the buyer in the
drivers seat, (pun intended) taking the hassle out of buying a car
and putting the customer in control, while offering excellent
customer service.