A successful family-owned car company? In the Midlands? Never! Not the first time the Morgan Motor Company is going against the flow. Sam Metcalf caught up with Charles Morgan to talk about what makes the firm such a rare success.
In a fractured Midlands automotive sector, the serene progress of the Morgan Motor Company often goes completely unnoticed. Yet the Malvern-based company, under the stewardship of Charles Morgan, continues to confound critics and fight against the trend for offshore mass-manufactured assembly.
Charles Morgan is only the third generation of the family to head up the company in 98 years and, with its centenary just around the corner, he's more sure than ever before that the marque has what it takes to survive in this most cut-throat of industries.
"After the Second World War there were 65 independent car manufacturers in Britain," he says, "We're the only ones left. We can thank my father - Peter - for that. It's such a shame that he'll not be around for the centenary, because he would've loved that.
Peter Morgan guided the company through the turbulent years of 20th century car manufacturing, but it was Charles' grandfather, Henry, who built Morgan up from nothing.
"My grandfather came up with an idea; to make motoring affordable," says Morgan, "but it's my father who must take huge credit for the state the company finds itself in today."
Morgan talks fondly about the heritage of the brand throughout our time together, telling me that the company's archives are still home to the very first turnover figures. He says: "When my grandfather introduced the two-seater Morgan in the 1920s things really took off for the company. We were the first motor manufacturer to have a car in the window at Harrods. Back then we only spent £320 a year on research and development (R&D) and we were still wildly successful, so any firms today shouldn't worry if their R&D spend is still small."
After the Second World War Morgan Motor Company looked overseas for its kicks and found a welcoming hand in the shape of the US. These "gung-ho" years, as Morgan calls them, saw the company successful in sports car racing, culminating in 1962 with a Le Mans triumph. This success led in turn to a foray into the French market, where the company's cars were and still are well received.
Exports are vitally important to the future of Morgan Motor Company. Over 70 per cent of its cars are sold overseas and Morgan finds pleasure in this, saying: "We're proud to be a worldwide company, but it hasn't always been easy. In the 1920s the marque had developed such a reputation that copies were being made under licence in France."
But as good as that was for the brand, the cars being made in France were not a patch on those manufactured in Malvern and everything was brought back in-house once the depression hit.
Morgan is keen to push the marque's innovation and the way that is has managed to adapt to worldwide markets. He puts the evolution of Morgan Motor Company into three 30-year cycles and points out that the beginning of the third of these coincided with increased legislation in the market.
And now the company has taken the leap into green motoring. Morgan Motor Company's Lifecar is a two-and-half-year long project which, says Morgan, "marks a step change in vehicle power technology, producing a combination of performance, range and fuel economy that will be essential to the motoring world of the future."
Lifecar is based on the Morgan Aero Eight and is powered by a fuel cell, which converts hydrogen - and oxygen taken from the air around it - into electrical energy. Designed by nearby Qinetiq, it will be clean, quiet and economic, and the only waste product from the car will be water.
The key to delivering this step change in energy efficiency lies in a combination of factors, including weight reduction and a different design approach. This approach exploits opportunities across the vehicle to reduce energy losses and requirements.
Regenerative braking and surplus energy will be used to charge ultra-capacitors, which will release their energy when the car is accelerating. This will allow the car to have a much smaller fuel cell than is conventionally regarded as necessary: it will only be as large as is required to provide cruising speed, approximately 24 kW, as opposed to around 85kW proposed by most competitor systems.
Morgan explains the idea behind the car: "This is a project which captures the imagination. Lifecar promises to combine advanced technology while retaining the best in traditional ways of designing and building cars. A sports car that is beautiful, brilliant to drive, but pollution free must be a goal worth striving for."
Strong words for someone in an industry that seems to habitually lurch from one crisis to another. But Morgan is different; it doesn't have the baggage associated with its mass-manufactured rivals - if indeed they can be called rivals.
This all leads Morgan to declare his undying love for the Midlands automotive industry, which he thinks has a rosy future. He says: "As long as those in the industry are prepared to have some kind of foresight, then I see a bright future for Midlands industry.
"Looking after the environment should be top of everyone's list and this represents a big challenge - but also a huge opportunity. Legislation can put you out of business, but if you keep pace then you've got a real chance of growth at the moment, I feel."
The fact that Morgan Motor Company is still independent is quite something. The fact that it is still family-owned is nothing short of amazing. There must have been offers for the company in the past, but they've been warded off and Morgan remains fairly relaxed about the situation, saying: "It's not a problem, really. We've managed to maintain our core market while our competitors have struggled. The fact is that people like something being made especially for them.
"Our detractors point to the fact that we have waiting lists, when in fact the waiting lists often work in our favour because it shows that each machine is made with car and is completely bespoke.
"Like any company who relies on exports so heavily we're at the mercy of the markets, but if, say, the French market is a bit slow then we've been able to rely on the German market, for example."
For a product that is so quintessentially British, Morgan Motor Company sure has a lot of overseas admirers.
And Morgan does like to tell a good tale or two about this army of admirers. He breaks off from his export drive to recount the time he spent spreading the Morgan word in Japan. He says: "I was in the garden of the British Embassy in Tokyo. I was giving one of those interminable speeches that had to be translated because I don't speak Japanese. Anyway, all of a sudden the crowd parted for this figure to come through and everyone started bowing.
"It turned out it was the Japanese Minister for Trade and Industry and he'd turned up because he owns a Morgan. It didn't stop him falling asleep through the rest of my speech, though."
Morgan clearly revels in his role as the head of his family's business. And why wouldn't he? he spent most of his formative years as a cameraman during Afghanistan's civil war. The car industry can be tough, but it must seem like a walk in the park compared with that.
Would he ever sell the Morgan business? Not likely. "People seem to forget that a lot of the big car manufacturers are still partly owned by the families who set them up. Companies like Porsche and Peugeot are still guided by the people who started the businesses all those years ago. We're really not that different," he says, shrugging.
And his recipe for success is similarly simple. "What companies looking to grow need to do is look back at their history if they want to learn anything," he says. "See what works and what doesn't work. Making the same mistake twice isn't an option in business.
"Expose your company in every way, shape, form and fashion like we have and you won't go far wrong."