matthehat17

There's a paragraph in that story from the Blackpool paper in which a man is quoted who has been laid off THREE TIMES by TVR...

...not wishing to make light of what is a sorry situation, but do you think he might have seen this coming...?

EDIT: Sorry guys, didn't mean to post twice, I was trying to amend my first post but my bloody Mac is playing what is known in the trade as "silly buggers".

Bada Bing!

I think they were offering good pay and stuff more recently though, but otherwise yes I would agree. I've seen the same people go through 3 rounds of redundancy then moan about getting buggerall when the company eventually goes bust.

DUH!

matthehat17

It's a shame for the guy really, but I'd have shipped out once they made me redundant the first time. TVR has always seemed a company on shaky ground to me; love the cars in principle, not so sure I'd ever buy one though.

Mans Best

It's not just about having the right product, because that ignores the question of price and with that you have to deal with the competition. In a world economy (which is where the UK is) companies have to compete against global competitors and there are two countries immediately come to mind (India and China) that can offer massively reduced labour costs and 'good' labour relations (for now at least). In the case of India there is a highly educated young sector of their population and both countries know a thing or two about trading and making a buck. These are all plusses when it comes to manufacturing, so hey presto. Quel surprise!

Thing is, a lot of British companies have had to learn the hard way how to get on in this and TVR isn't one of them. This brings to mind the collapse of the European motorcycle industry when outsmarted by the Japanese and other industries such as textiles, steel, and the list goes on.

Personally, I never cared for TVRs so won't miss them at all, but you would think there would be room in the market for niche players who can get their act together - Noble perhaps and certainly Caterham?

It's survival of the fittest I'm afraid and that means no subsidies in my view.

rralston

Some intereting points raised so far, most complete tosh though about image and price

Nicholai - as he's known was a little bit bullish in his approach to where he wants, or wanted TVR to go. (all these points are based from direct dealer feedback ie MD's and Service Managers)

He ultimately wanted the highest performing, aesthetically shocking(his words not mine) reliable and cost effective sports cars in the UK market. (plans for Europe were in place)

So what did he do? Significantly improve the quality of the manufacturing process, implement 3yr warrantees, implement an extended warrantee scheme, kept the prices of the cars the same.

What went wrong? Pretty simple really. Labour costs, ability of workforce to adapt, not enough resource to maintain warrantee agreement, widening brand appeal(due to warrantee and reliability claims) but not having the resource to rectify problems.

Final result - well its clear that decisions need to made, but it's simple speculation on what they should do.

Am I worried? To be honest no. There are enough talented people in the TVR network that can maintain the car, and fullfil my 3rd party warrantee.

Also - can the silly people who keep talking about TVR pricing themselves out of their market (ie S2000, Boxsters etc) please get their coats.......

A Sagaris is

Nick Graves

QUOTE (rahula @ Apr 24 2006, 06:19 PM)
Sometimes I do wonder what happened to all the clever people, architects and engineers in the UK.

They're all leaving in droves! Maybe if we Asked Tony Blair/Charles Clark to fark up TVR completely, they'd then turn it into a success story.

BTW, many of the world's motor manufacturers are losing money, during a sales boom.

Think of all the competitors TVR now have, mainly form Germany & Japan.

Honda et al prove that one can make decent cars in the UK. TVR's just too small to be able to affored the development.

Shiskine

Been there, done that ...