Motor Cars
In this MOM film, the visual narrative of car assembly is accompanied by some facts and figures about cars in general, so here we will concentrate on the manufacturer that was kind enough to let us in - Jaguar cars. The factory covers 106 acres, and so filming was very arduous and took over two days! Every point on the production line has its own manager, responsible for health and safety, which meant that a lot of our time was spent negotiating for good shooting positions! Getting into the paint room took an enormous amount of persuasion, as the paint shop is classified as a dust and hair free zone. Fortunately, our cameraman is almost bald so they let him in. It was somewhat embarrassing, though, that during filming he managed to strike the 'emergency stop' button with his bottom, and halt the entire car production process!
A pair of Blackpool lads, both called William, sowed the seeds that would grow into Jaguar cars back in 1922. Messers Walmsley and Lyons specialised in sticking sidecars onto motor bikes, and called their firm The Swallow Sidecar Company. The company moved into coachworking for motor cars in 1926, and a range of cars followed carrying the 'Standard Swallow' logo. However, the initials SS took on a ghastly new meaning when Hitler's Nazis arrived to start the second world war, and so in 1945 the name Jaguar was adopted.
After a number of mergers and acquisitions, British Leyland, Jaguar's parent company, was in trouble, and the firm was nationalised in the nineteen-seventies. In the eighties the Thatcher government sold their holding in Jaguar Cars to the Ford motor company. But history has a habit of repeating itself, and in 2008 Ford's shrinking market share led them to sell Jaguar to the powerful Tata Group of India.
The one thing that impressed us as we filmed at Jaguar was the real dedication and loyalty of the workers, and it was a shame to see how they had been messed around by successive changes in ownership and management. Although we couldn't say it in the film, we can say here that as honoured guests at the factory, and proud owners of their cars, we at MoM very much hope that Jaguar's success continues long into the future.
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Production Notes
Locations:
Jaguar Cars Ltd, Castle Bromwich, Birmingham;
Jaguar Heritage Trust, Coventry, West Midlands;
Tamar Bridge, Saltash, Devon.