Car Dealers, Garages, Petrol Stations

Are you sure you don't mean the early 90's? The reason I say this is because I bought my first new car from this garage in 1989, it was a Metro City 1000.

You could be right zigzag, my date memory is poor. My younger brother will confirm it. Thanks

The Parkside Garage on Warwick Road opened in the September 1929, built on ground formerly occupied by Perkins' greenhouses and nursery. The building itself had a huge uninterrupted space on each floor, achieved by huge girders, which made it the garage with the largest single-span roof of any in the country.

A couple of garages not mentioned but used by some of our older members as follows Gardeners Garage, Gulson Road, opposite corner to the dairy, sold petrol and cars also carried out repairs, tel number 2307 Alec Statham, former speedway rider had a garage in Gulson Road, opposite the clinic, carried out repairs, sold petrol and a good source of spare parts from the scrapyard at the rear. There was also a further garage in Far Gosford St, Wyatt Motors, tel no 3590.

Owned by Astons of Coventry in 1950 / 1960's not quite sure when Rented to Rayfield Autos Light Cars used for a while More history bottom of photo

Rayfield Autos operated from various locations in Coventry including Lower Ford Street, Gulson Road What is their history, who started the company and what happened to them

Company Check link

After a trip to the Vintage Motorcycle Club's HQ at Burton-onTrent this morning a friend and I were surprised to find that the Norton he is restoring was registered by Blamires. Now I can remember the garage as a lad but never realised that they sold motorbikes, obviously before my time (the bike is a 1936 model 18). That's all I know, can anyone come up with anything of the pre-war era???

Not sure if this is what you're after. Scroll down to Queens Road Garage. He also liked aeroplanes, 2nd photo down - link.

My first full time job was with a firm of Accountants in Queens Road, a short distance down from Percy Blamires but on the opposite side of the road. As it happened, Percy's Queens Road Garage was one of 'our' clients. This was in the early 1970s Blamire's had an unequaled reputation for customer service and consequently had an incredibly high number of regular customers, all of whom went to him for their new cars, and nowhere else. Although he seemed to specialise in Jaguars, he would supply any make that he was asked to supply, brand new or used. I seem to remember that also extended to motor cycles even in the 1970s. A joke at the time was that he would also supply sit-on lawnmowers if asked to do so... Percy was well known for his love of air racing. He replaced his Miles Gemini pictured in the link above in 1972 with a brand new Piper Cherokee Arrow, registered G-AZSF. This also carried his air race number of 80. I'm not 100% sure but I feel he owned his Cherokee until shortly before his death. Percy Blamire - a real gent..

A few more Sam Robbins - Austin Main Dealer Rayfield Autos Beauchamp Motors Light Cars - Reliant and Colt Astons - Austin

In 1986/7 I was commuting from Coventry to a job in Redditch at a firm called BKL Fittings. For a while I was using a rather ratty Allegro but then I bought a Mini 1275GT on HP, the only time I have ever borrowed money to buy a vehicle. Coming home one day there was a lot of snow on the roads, not good with the Mini due to the limited ground clearance. Anyway along Holyhead Road it got to the point that none of the wheels were touching the road and the car spun and ended up on the pavement outside the BMW showroom that is now called Styner. There were wooden bollards on the pavement to stop people from parking and my car ended up between 2 of these, having scraped a bit of white paint off a bollard. Instantly one of the garage staff was out there, saying I must pay for the damage to their bollard. I told him where to stick his bollards, drove off and never heard any more about it!

I have just read this section of the site for the first time. I noticed that the first post mentioned Coventry Garage on the Holyhead Road. My uncle (Les Swain) was the sales director there until he died following a heart attack. For obvious reasons my first three or four second hand cars were all purchased from there. My regular garage for servicing and petrol was the Leicester Garage on Leicester Causeway, it was run by two brothers Bob and Bill Turrell, both really nice guys always very helpful. Whilst cruising around Google Street View on a nostalgic binge the other evening, I was amazed to see that there is still a garage on the same site called 'Bob & Bills'. I am now left wondering if these are relatives of the Bob & Bill that I knew back in the 60's or has the name just been adopted?

I think Bob and Bills, is now run by Paul and Martin Turrell, Bob's children.

Thanks for that bohica. Nice to know that it's still in the family. Do you know if Bob & Bill are still around?