Joseph Cyril Bamford | |
---|---|
Born | Uttoxeter, Staffordshire, England | 21 June 1916
Died | 1 March 2001 84) London, England | (aged
Alma mater | Stonyhurst College |
Occupation | Businessman |
Years active | 1945–2001 |
Known for | J.C. Bamford Excavators (JCB) |
Successor | Anthony Bamford |
Spouse | Marjorie Griffin (m. 1941) |
Children | Anthony Bamford, Mark Bamford |
Relatives | Jo Bamford (grandson) |
Joseph Cyril Bamford, CBE (21 June 1916 – 1 March 2001) [1] was a British businessman. He was the founder of J.C. Bamford Excavators Limited (JCB), a manufacturer of heavy equipment.
Joseph Bamford was born into a recusant Catholic family in Uttoxeter, Staffordshire, which owned Bamfords Ltd, an agricultural engineering business. [2]
His great-grandfather Henry Bamford [3] was born in Yoxall and had built up his own ironmongers business, which by 1881 employed 50 men, 10 boys and 3 women. Bamfords International Farm Machinery became one of the country's major agricultural equipment suppliers, famous for its balers, rakes, hay turners, hay wufflers, mangold cutters, and standing engines, which were exported all over the world. The company eventually ceased trading in 1986.[ citation needed ]
After attending Stonyhurst College, he joined the Alfred Herbert company in Coventry, then the UK's largest machine-tool manufacturer, and rose to represent the firm in Ghana. He returned home in 1938 to join the family firm, but in 1941 was called up by the RAF to serve in World War II. Working in supply and logistics, he returned to the African Gold Coast to run a staging post for USAF planes being ferried to the Middle East. [1]
Upon his return home in 1944, Bamford initially worked for English Electric developing electric welding equipment in Stafford. A short return stint with the family firm proved too stifling, and his uncle Henry released him, saying he thought Joe had "little future ahead of him." [2] After selling Brylcreem for a short while, in October 1945 Bamford rented a 10 by 15 ft (3 by 5 m) lock-up garage for 30 shillings (= £1.50) a week, and made a farm trailer from scrap steel and war surplus Jeep axles, using a prototype electric welder bought for £2-10s (= £2.50). He opened for business on the day his first son, Anthony, was born, [2] and sold the trailer for £45 and a cart, which he also repaired and sold for another £45. [1]
Having no interest in taking over rival businesses, his philosophy of: "Focus on what you do best, be innovative, and re-invest in product development and the latest manufacturing technologies;" resulted in a series of market-leading innovations:
In 1958, he bought ten motorscooters with the number plates JCB1 to JCB10, to get their number plates to transfer to his firm's vehicles. [4]
With exports to the United States beginning, profits increased from 1960 onwards. JCB won seven Queen's Awards for Exports as its sales spread to more than 130 countries around the world, while Bamford himself was appointed a CBE for Services to Export in 1969. [1] In 1993, he became the first British citizen to be honoured in the Association of Equipment Manufacturers Hall of Fame, and remained the only British inductee until his son Anthony was inducted in 2008. [5]
What made Bamford different from many engineers was that he was also a marketeer. Bamford personally demanded to know daily from his staff how many "JCB Yellow" vehicles were off the road awaiting spares. Bamford created an image that JCBs were there to work, and if an owner-operator's machine was down, then Bamford wanted to know about it—which gained him 95% of the owner-operator market in the UK. [6]
Bamford placed a 12 V socket into the cab of his vehicles, and delivered the first 100 personally, arriving in his Rolls-Royce with number plate JCB1. One of the first Learjets in Europe was purchased to fly in non-UK customers (the fleet has since got larger [7] ), who were met by another European first, a stretched Cadillac with the same number of seats as the jet. Bamford also conceived the "dancing diggers," whose 1999 display in Las Vegas stopped the gamblers. [2]
A non-smoking teetotaller, who was so careful with his money that he claimed his wife still made their own curtains, Bamford worked from 09:00 until 23:00 every day. He saw his role in life to be like the Nonconformist Cadbury and Lever families. He built Rocester along the lines of Bournville and Port Sunlight into an effective marketing home for the company, and an efficient production centre and a virtual "home" for his employees. He saw no need to recognise trade unions. The Rocester works were surrounded by 10,000 acres (40 km2) of landscaped grounds in which his company's employees could shoot, fish, swim, and sail. [1] [8]
Bamford paid more than fair wages, which rose regularly, and annual bonuses based on reports of individual worth. In 1967 Bamford stood on a farm cart and handed out personal cheques totalling £250,000. This extraordinary focus in return gave unprecedented levels of workforce flexibility, with the average JCB employee through the strike-dominated 1970s and early 1980s, being seven times more productive than the average British manufacturing worker. [1]
In 1975, Bamford left his wife Marjorie (née Griffin – married 1941), handed over the business to their two sons Anthony and Mark, [9] [10] [11] and set up home with his secretary, Jayne Ellis, in Switzerland as tax exiles. [12] He continued to design both boats and diesel engines. Bamford was awarded the honorary degree of a Doctor of Technology from both Loughborough University in 1983 [13] and Keele University in 2000. [14]
His grandson, Jo Bamford, briefly worked at JCB before moving into the hydrogen energy sector.
Bamford died in a London clinic on 1 March 2001. [1] At his death, JCB was the largest privately owned engineering company in Britain, employing 4,500 people and manufacturing 30,000 machines a year in 12 factories on three continents. It had revenues of £850m in 1999, earned from 140 countries. [2]
His portraits by Lucinda Douglas-Menzies and Leslie Smithers (whilst he was still the head of his JCB empire) are in the National Portrait Gallery. [15]
Staffordshire is a landlocked ceremonial county in the West Midlands of England. It borders Cheshire to the northwest, Derbyshire and Leicestershire to the east, Warwickshire to the southeast, the West Midlands county and Worcestershire to the south, and Shropshire to the west. The largest settlement is the city of Stoke-on-Trent, and the county town is Stafford.
Uttoxeter is a market town and civil parish in the East Staffordshire borough of Staffordshire, England. It is near to the Derbyshire county border.
JCB may refer to:
Excavators are heavy construction equipment primarily consisting of a boom, dipper, bucket, and cab on a rotating platform known as the "house".
A backhoe is a type of excavating equipment, or excavator, consisting of a digging bucket on the end of a two-part articulated arm. It is typically mounted on the back of a tractor or front loader, the latter forming a "backhoe loader". The section of the arm closest to the vehicle is known as the boom, while the section that carries the bucket is known as the dipper, both terms derived from steam shovels. The boom, which is the long piece of the backhoe arm attached to the tractor through a pivot called the king-post, is located closest to the cab. It allows the arm to pivot left and right, typically through a range of 180 to 200 degrees, and also enables lifting and lowering movements.
J.C. Bamford Excavators Limited (JCB) is a British multinational manufacturer of equipment for construction, agriculture, waste handling, and demolition. It was founded in 1945 and is based in Rocester, Staffordshire, England.
The Case Corporation was a manufacturer of agricultural machinery and construction equipment. Founded, in 1842, by Jerome Increase Case as the J. I. Case Threshing Machine Company, it operated under that name for most of a century. For another 66 years it was the J. I. Case Company, and was often called simply Case. In the late 19th century, Case was one of America's largest builders of steam engines, producing self-propelled portable engines, traction engines and steam tractors. It was a major producer of threshing machines and other harvesting equipment. The company also produced various machinery for the U.S. military. In the 20th century, Case was among the ten largest builders of farm tractors for many years. In the 1950s its construction equipment line became its primary focus, with agricultural business second.
Rocester is a village and civil parish in the East Staffordshire district of Staffordshire, England. Its name is spelt Rowcestre in the Domesday Book. It is located on the Derbyshire border.
A manure spreader, muck spreader, or honey wagon is an agricultural machine used to distribute manure over a field as a fertilizer. A typical (modern) manure spreader consists of a trailer towed behind a tractor with a rotating mechanism driven by the tractor's power take off (PTO). Truck mounted manure spreaders are also common in North America.
The Association of Equipment Manufacturers (AEM) is a North American trade association representing off-road equipment manufacturers and suppliers. AEM represents more than 1,000 companies with more than 200 product lines in agriculture and construction-related industry sectors worldwide. AEM is based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Anthony Paul Bamford, Baron Bamford, is a British billionaire businessman who is the chairman of J.C. Bamford Excavators Limited (JCB). He succeeded his father, Joseph Cyril Bamford, as chairman and managing director of the company in 1975, at the age of 30. He was knighted in 1990. Bamford has appeared in the Sunday Times Rich List, and in 2021 his net worth was estimated at US$9.48 billion. Bamford is a car collector whose collection includes two examples of the rare Ferrari 250 GTO, valued upwards of $70 million each.
Steelfab was a Cardiff, Wales-based engineering firm that built the "Steelfab Digger", a competitor to the HyMac and JCB excavators in the 1960s. The company also built the Horndraulic brand of front loaders for fitting to agricultural tractors.
Tean is a large village in the civil parish of Checkley in the Staffordshire Moorlands district, in the county of Staffordshire, England. It is around 15 miles (24 km) south-east of Stoke-on-Trent. The River Tean runs through the village, heading east towards Uttoxeter.
NCK, started as a subsidiary of Newton, Chambers & Company, a large engineering company based in Sheffield, England. They produced the range of agricultural equipment, skimmers, excavators, cranes and draglines that were renowned for high quality and long life, typically over 20 years. Many NCK machines continue to operate worldwide.
The Queen's Award for Enterprise: International Trade (Export) (2008) was awarded on 21 April 2008, by Queen Elizabeth II.
The JCB Academy is a non-selective co-educational secondary school within the English University Technical College programme, in Rocester, Staffordshire, England. It specialises in engineering and business qualifications.
The agricultural machinery industry or agricultural engineering industry is the part of the industry, that produces and maintain tractors, agricultural machinery and agricultural implements used in farming or other agriculture. This branch is considered to be part of the machinery industry.
Joseph Cyril Edward Bamford is a British businessman. He is the owner of Wrightbus, a UK-based bus manufacturer.
J. C. Bamford may refer to:
Crakemarsh is a small settlement in the civil parish of Uttoxeter Rural, in the East Staffordshire district, in Staffordshire, England, near the town of Uttoxeter.