No Two The Same. A documentary on Lord Stokes of British Leyland, and the 1969 Motor Show F653

A short documentary about Lord Stokes (1914-2008) and his role in the rise of the British Leyland Empire. There are some interesting shots of BBC reporter Cliff Michelmore interviewing Lord Stokes at the Motor Show at Earls Court (1969 I think).
This is from a series of 13 minute films (In this form "No Two the Same") designed to promote British industry/commerce and culture/creative exports at the time.

[@saxongreen78]

'No two the same.' - They're talking about identically specified Marinas leaving Cowley...ya never know what ya gunna get!

[@jamesanderton344]

Yep. “No two the same” appeared to apply to water pumps too. Unfortunately the parts are supposed to be interchangeable...

[@stuart8663]

He was a great speaker and imbued confidence.

[@VictorGate]

Around 1970, Lord Stokes' accountants looked at the vast web of main dealers, dealers and agencies selling his new cars and decided it would be a positive move to streamline it and cut out the bottom 20%. So, having lost your Austin Dealership you are approached by a Mr Honda and asked to use your skill and contacts to sell his cars instead. Sadly Ford had the same idea at the same time. Guess what happened next.

[@jamesanderton344]

Owned a couple of Minis from this era....the build quality showed pure contempt for the customer....after two I went Japanese and never went back

[@antonialeitz9179]

Stokes should have stuck to buses, he certainly killed Britain's No 1 export! LOL

[@SB-vb8ch]

This sums it all up well...utter complacently & ignorance to what was happening under his own nose...This is why studying history is so important!

[@VictorGate]

I heard from an observer at the time, the take over talks between Stokes (Leyland), and Harriman (BMC) were not a great battle, Only Lyons (Jaguar) put up any sort of a fight probably because his own history and fortune were invested in it. Stokes is the man who put Robinson in to run Jaguar Cars or BL Luxury Car Division as he preferred to call it. As US Jaguar owners said at the time, "Don't let your wife out alone at night in the Jaguar". Platitudes to Michelmore, car salesman speak. Asked why the Maxi didn't sell he blamed the financial turn down not that the gear box was a bag of nails, I know, I brought one!

[@TeddyBear-ii4yc]

Why can't your wife use the Jag at night? It's not bcos of that 70s doggerel verse is it? If you wanna buy a car buy a jag, Cos there's room in the back for a shxg, There's a yellow tin in with sxxxxxxs in, If you wanna buy a car buy a jag. 😊

[@paullacey2999]

He talked a good game,I'll give him that....

[@smithy3520]

only 10 percent of cars coming from abroad...oh the glory years

[@MajorKlanga]

Absolutely nothing to do with import duties I'm sure.

[@paullacey2999]

@@MajorKlanga Our cars being unreliable rustbuckets had nothing to do with it..

[@Steve-rv1ql]

There is absolutely no glory in having 90% of the market when customers hated the product, at the first possible opportunity they left to buy something vastly better in every way, with the exception of Jaguar, BL’s product was beyond appalling and they totally deserved to fail. What happened to Jaguar was the icing on a rotten cake, brilliant car, built by a bunch of morons with antique tooling. I owned a 76 XJ, loved the car and became a proficient tech maintaining it, never in nearly 50 years of motoring have never I owned such an unreliable car, just about everything broke at some point and the body rusted out in 6 years. My second dance with this devil happened when I bought an 83 metro turbo, kept for 9 months, what utter junk.

[@semiretired86]

Stokes didn't understand the market this video was made the year after the Escort MKI was launched and the same year as the mki Capri launched (and 3 years after the 1st Corolla launched)

[@nickush7512]

Well, come 1970 and everything is looking roses for the indiginous british car industry thereafter.....

[@nickb5391]

Stokes was the one that stopped competition motor sport, got rid of Healey & Cooper

[@paulbroderick8438]

Stokes should have kept to lorries and buses! Anything BL touched spelt disaster.

[@keithmartin1328]

If only he could have forseen the disaster that would hit the company over the following 10-15 years.

[@TeddyBear-ii4yc]

11:55 re: Lord Stokes interview with Cliff Mitchelmore. It's not hard to see why the British car industry went awry. He's so complacent I want to shake him. Talk about 'resting on their laurels'. But I have the benefit of hindsight. The bus, coaches & lorries: were they getting 'snagged' or minor production faults fixed? Hardly a production line...

[@peterbradshaw8018]

One gets the bookkeeping, cost control and quality control was found wanting.

[@VictorGate]

It was once said that BMC then later as BL never knew how much a Mini cost to build and sell.

[@ianjarrett2724]

Stokes had a battery 🔋 +/- in Canley with Rover Group.

[@johntechwriter]

“How I oversaw the destruction of the British car industry.”

[@robertneill3057]

Old Crock. British bread and butter motor industry got it wrong back in the late 1940's with the 'Atlantic' export saloon. Also learnt about the supposed botch done with the Morris Minor body with the strip down the middle on another tv programme. Was this a fore runner of things to come?

[@NoosaHeads]

Stokes was nothing more than a jumped up street peddlar. He alienated the unions, the dealers and even his own management staff. Being chief executive of British Leyland was _inversely_ proportional to capability and _directly_ proportional to political connections. BL turned out abysmally made, unreliable cars. If the shoddy manufacture was anything to go by, Stokes held his customers in utter contempt. It was a miracle that the company lasted as long as it did.

[@drstevenrey]

1:40, the Swiss guy is Walter Frei. This man imported all British makes to the country, the company still exists. However, very soon after 1970 he discovered Toyota and Nissan. Yes, they still sell Jag's, but the bulk of the sales are Japanese. This goes all the way back to the Swiss citizen, who knows quality and will not accept a bad product, produced badly, prepared badly and designed badly. Switzerland is the country of cheese, chocolate and watches. Those watches are the immediate downfall of British cars.

[@Baetzibaer]

Wrong! The Swiss guy is Walter Frey ...

[@timcant4350]

As they mention in The Third man , 600 years of civilisation and what do they make - the cuckoo clock ! sums it up nicely.

[@nygelmiller5293]

To drstesverrey. Half of our family is from Switzerland. My cousin from Switzerland came to see us in ENGLAND, in the family's Morris 1100. She told me they were impressed with it, because of the Hydrolastic suspension, which "conquered" France's crude PAVE cobbles that we're usually so bumpy. However, my cousin was horrified, that when our government devalued the Pound, to make our products cheaper (and therefore SELL more,) in countries like Switzerland, instead of passing on the lower price onto consumers in Switzerland, the Swiss importer instead continued to charge the same for the cars, and pocketed the difference!

[@nygelmiller5293]

@@timcant4350 I'm Mr. Can't, you "cant" have heard about Swiss precision engineering (like Japan) , in ALL things, not just watches! Dud you know they were responsible for the improve ments to Jaguar and Rolls-Royce engines, when they began to consider fuel efficiency? The Swiss engineers succeeded in making these engines a fifth more economical!

[@johnmiller0000]

"No Two The Same" - whereas that is a great point for the modern BMW MINI, it was a lamentable state of affairs for anything with the BL badge. They were supposed to be the same!

[@jigln202]

Hi there, I see you have a video up of Freddie Mills vs the Big American, Joe Baksi, which is excellent, Thank you. Tell me, I'm just wondering, IF maybe you, or pehaps one of your sources, might have any Film Footage of Mills' contemporary Bert Gilroy? him and Mills fought each other too, in 1944, but Gilroy also fought Woodcock, Hawkins, the Frenchmen Marcel Cerdan, Don Cockell and a hundred others, literally, such was boxing in that period. But yes, would love to see some footage of Gilroy, BERT GILROY, if you might have some, or know someone who does. Thank you, Great Channel, I have now Subscribed... fingers crossed.

[@maxustaxus]

Hi, I am glad you enjoyed the other video, and thanks for the sub. I am sorry to say that I do not have any film of Bert Gilroy...but now you have mentioned this I will keep a special eye out. And rest assured I would put any interesting old footage of this sort on YT whenever I come across it.

[@jigln202]

@@maxustaxus Great, thank you, maybe some of the collectors or other persons who share this sort of Video History that you do here, might have some, or they too, might know of some sort of Lead... Thank you, very much, yes I'll be watching.

[@malcolmcowan9554]

Success guy was a disaster. Hes done nothing to save bl or go with the times. Britain was relic of the past these people had old minds no vision for the future reason why bl is gone. plus the reason why people bought datsuns there cars were light years ahead. Reason why Britain has problems to this day no vision

[@leewinters606]

Yes had alot to do with socialism and uncontrolled union power that stopped it moving on a bit like today with the woke ajender wanting a lot of pay for poor quality and poor productivity west Germany at the time had no problems with these unions nor did the Japanese that mite answer your question.one man one job was thinking in the uk ,instead of a flexible workforce.

[@MajorKlanga]

What an irritating bloke going around saying "what about...?". Shame he didn't have a clue about motivating workers and product planning.

[@aureliobrighton1871]

No wonder ... a chap who has loved busses from early on .. would not rest to squeeze every unit under one roof . which has to be french and italian territory only ;)

[@gemspotting6252]

He never understood brands or loss leading to build said brands

[@Baetzibaer]

Could someone please have mercy and restore the colours of this movie?

[@maxustaxus]

Perhaps you would like to do this? I can send you a link to the raw comp file, and you can spend a couple of weeks struggling with the AI to get this done. Don't forget that you will be doing this for nothing, as not only is this channel not monitised, but even if it was you may not get any more hits. I understand your frustration, however, in a world of endless film, but limited time...someone must step forward, rather than appoint another.

[@analogueman123456787]

@@maxustaxus - Indeed, though one must be grateful he spelt the word 'colours' correctly! 😉