If you think America’s auto business is a sad shadow of its former self, take a look at Britain’s. So many illustrious marques are gone, ruined by incompetent management, government meddling, and militant labor. The story of Triumph encapsulates it well.
Triumph was founded in 1885 as a bicycle importer in the city of Coventry. In 1897, they became known as the Triumph Cycle Company and started building motorcycles in 1902. Orders from the British army during World War I made the company very prosperous and by 1918 they were Europe’s larger motorcycle builder.
In 1923, Triumph went into the car business and did a fairly good job of it, so much that in 1930 they became the Triumph Motor Company. But in the late 30s, the company ran into financial troubles. In 1939, the Triumph Motor Company went bankrupt. In 1940, the factory was destroyed by a German air raid. That could’ve been the end.
But rumors of Triumph’s death were greatly exaggerated. The rights to use their name were purchased by the Standard Motor Company in 1944 and the Triumph name once again appeared in 1946.
Triumph’s signature line was born in 1952 with the TR-2. This 2 seater was the prototypical British roadster and was a huge hit, especially in that super lucrative export market, America. Triumph had gone from bankrupt to cash cow in 13 years. The more powerful TR-3 was introduced in 1955.
As the 50s ended, Standard realized that their name was extremely boring, and Triumph sounded, well, Triumphant. Therefore, the Standard name was phased out and the Triumph line was expanded. The first product of this decision was the 1959 Herald. Designed by Michelotti of Italy, it was very handsome, and despite being much more conventional than the front wheel drive Mini and rear engined Hillman Imp, it still sold well and earned its place on Britain’s motoring scene.
Leyland was a successful manufacturer of trucks and buses. In 1960, they bought Triumph to diversify into the auto business. In 1967 they would also buy Rover (of Land Rover fame). This merger was not a bad move actually. The company was profitable and was producing fine products.
Triumph used the Leyland money to modernize its sports cars. The TR-3 got redesigned into the TR-4. The Herald chassis was made into the Spitfire, a smaller roadster to supplement the TR-4. Things were going very well. But there were storm clouds coming.
British Motor Corporation was an industrial giant, producing 40% of Britain’s cars. By the end of the 60s, however, the company was on the brink of bankruptcy. Britain’s Labour government did not want all those job losses laid at their feet, so they came up with an idea. They noted how Leyland’s profits were far larger than BMC’s losses. So why not merge them together into British Leyland and save Britain’s auto industry? What could possibly go wrong?
In a word, everything. Take all of GM’s problems and multiply them by 10 and that’s what BL was. Take the Triumph Stag for instance. It was very good looking and had a clever roof design that provided open top fun with a rollover bar that would keep it legal even if the Americans slapped on any rollover regulations. Unfortunately, Triumph screwed up badly with the engine. If they were rational, they would’ve used Rover’s V8 engine. Bought from Buick in 1963, this V8 was lightweight, powerful, tunable, compact, and extremely reliable. It would’ve made the perfect engine for this new GT car.
So what does Triumph do? They took two of their own 4 cylinder engines, joined them together at the crankshaft, and got their own V8. This was a very bad move. The resulting engine would constantly overheat and when that happened, the cylinder heads would warp. This was an extremely costly mistake, so much so that the Stag had to be pulled from the very important American market in 1973 and then killed off in 1977. I would say this car did more than any other to kill Triumph, given the huge profit margins that can be earned on cars like this. It could’ve been a huge cash cow.
That was not even the beginning of their incompetence. In 1975, the TR-6 roadster was replaced by the impressively hideous TR-7. The shape was penned by Harris Mann, apparantly using a slice of cheese as his inspiration. Worse, the lovely and smooth inline six made way for a not-so-lovely and anemic 4 cylinder. This made its sports car pretensions questionable and hurt sales.
Even if Triumph had designed its cars better, there was still the issue of building them. Britain was gripped by a wave of strikes in the 70s. They were so bad that even the Labour Party put restrictions on. Wildcat strikes would break out over very petty issues and because of the way assembly lines work, it would bring everything to a halt. There were also issues of quality which was absolutely awful.
This was all very bad and, in 1975, BL went bankrupt and was nationalized. In 1977, Michael Edwardes was brought in to fix everything. One thing he did was arrange a tie up with Honda, in the hopes that they could provide a little quality to their poorly built lineup.
Events at Triumph got worse. In 1980, the Pound appreciated greatly relative to the Dollar, meaning they were losing money on every car they sold in America. They had no choice but to pull out. The next year, the TR-7 was killed off with no replacement. Triumph’s sports car days were over.
In 1981, the Honda deal produced the Triumph Acclaim, a rebadged Honda Ballade. It was a super bland, if reliable, family sedan not befitting the Triumph name. In 1984, as BL rationalized its operations, the Triumph nameplate was retired.