History
“We would like to add to the History section of Haymill so if you have any additions or corrections, please do leave a comment via “Leave a Reply” at the bottom of the page”
Haymill Motors the company was formed by George Bate on 16 September 1960 and operated initially from the Slough Trading Estate, and as such was the first UK appointed dealership for Saab.
During 1963 Haymill Motors moved to it’s new home for the next 40 plus years at Beaconsfield Road in Farnham Common, this was a new build facility on the site of what was the old “Central Garage” from Farnham Common of the 1930’s. The site consisted of a showroom opened by the legendary driver Eric Carlsson and his wife Pat Moss, a Petrol Forecourt “Esso” and a workshop and Lube bay…
During the late 1960’s and 1970’s Haymill became the Distributor of parts to 11 counties and assisted other Saab dealerships in technical and car supply.
In 1977 George Bate sold the business that was Haymill Motors to Saab GB who were now based at Fieldhouse Lane in Marlow, but retained ownership of the buildings and land. Saab in 1978 built a Technical Training School next to the Accounts department and Technicians from all over the country would travel to Farnham Common for their technical training.
A point to note is that although Haymill Motors was the first Saab dealer in the UK during the 1960-1982 period it held franchises for Saab, Rootes, Mazda, BMW, Daf, MV Augusta, Fiat, British Leyland and Honda.
During the early 1980’s Haymill updated it’s Petrol Forecourt, also demolishing a four bedroom house at the rear of the property to create more car parking space, and updated it’s facilities along with changing it’s name in 1983 from Haymill Motors to Saab Haymill.
Also the 1980’s saw Haymill grow it car sales volumes and achieved some very notable awards as the First dealer to sell a then record 600 new cars in 1987… Also it won many awards and was also the first Saab dealer in the UK to purchase 1 Million pounds of parts in the late 80’s.
1992 saw the sale of Saab Haymill to the Management Team led by Paul Whitehouse. This also necessitated another name change to Haymill Saab, Haymill also changed our forecourt brand that year to Mobil.
Over the next 11 years Haymill continued to thrive and in 2004 added an additional brand Mazda and the site was modernised and a second showroom added. This required us to rent a warehouse on the slough trading estate to store parts and prepare new cars for sale. Haymill Mazda became operational in December 2004…
In December 2006 Haymill Automotive Ltd comprising Haymill Saab and Haymill Mazda was sold to Hughes Of Beaconsfield Ltd and continues today as Hughes Saab and Hughes Mazda.
Had a look at a road level image of the old Haymill site. Not a trace of what was there, and no-one would ever know looking at the building there now, (to be a nursing home when complete) that it ever existed.
I think I must be a jinx. Nearly every company I worked for has gone or almost so. Originally, Vauxhall Motors where I served a 5 year apprenticeship in the Sevice Division at Luton. The company all but gone now, along with the plant, except the name, and now owned by the French
Then Stewart and Arden, Morris Distibutors in Acton West London, swallowed up by the Henley Group. Both gone.
That was followed by Henry Relays on Bath Road Slough, manufacturers of automaitic blood and tissue processing machines. Gone; don’t know why
Then Haymill.
That was followed by the world famous Hoover Ltd. A mere shadow today of what it was when I was a field Area Service Manager.
Then finally a company, Skyviews and General in Leeds. They were Europe’s biggest aerial photographic company specialising in low level aerial obligues of farms till 1980 when they started to film “normal” houses too. In 1991, one of their planes was smashed out of the air by an RAF Jaguar jet travelling at 500mph 8 miles (as the crow files) from where I live now in Mid Wales. Niether of the aircrew were looking where they were flying as they were too busy looking for a phone box on the ground. It resulted in the company being wound up in 1998.
Just bad luck or progress?
Bought my first Saab there.A 900 turbo 5 door Salesman was Peter Orpin. Wrote it off in a hailstorm ,but not the cars fault.Bought 4 more Saab’s between 1985 and 1995.
To anyone who worked with John Healy, he sadly passed away on 7th June 2019. We are having the funeral at Slough crematorium at 12.00 on 8th July 2019. All from Haymill welcome
hi i was there from 1989-2001… i worked with some of the people mentioned in the above comments… Chris broker is Still There! but sadly the gates will be finally closing at the end of this year… it was a brilliant place to work, and the social life with all fellow colleagues made us all like one big family. the outings and the christmas weekenders were legend!
I started with Haymill in 1972 in the parts dept with Bob Harbour ,Jack Miles ,Roy Fisher , and a few others ,Jacko you have a few name wrong Barry Porter and his Brother Alan Porter are in the picture Norman Long ,George Omitigan was the Painter, Norman Evans ,Dave Mathews ,CHRIS BROOKER ,longest standing person at Haymill think he is there,Paul Kiddle , Laurie Watts,.Cathy Brown, Hazel, Ross, that’s all I can remember ,also Jacko I thought you may also remember after changing brake pads on a 900 you parked it up without pumping the pedal up and finished up through the accounts wall ! PS we need to have a Christmas get together perhaps at the Royal Oak opposite Haymill,All the beat Alan.
I was an apprentice mechanic at central garage from 1963 it was a Rootes dealership then, reading some of the other comments I remember the small tea room I had to make the tea at tea break which soon filled up with cigy smoke created by Charlie the storeman he always had a fag on the go. Bill porter was my foreman he was a great mechanic. there was chris statham another mechanic and spencer arnott the other apprentice.I was a Mod in those days so parking my scooter in the garage was not a problem,those who had cars were permitted to park in the car park of The royal oak pub opposite the garage.The house at the back of the garage was lived in by Fred the manager I cant remember his last name the house came with the job.
Some of you older folk from the early 60s will doubtless remember my father, Jack French, who was the first SAAB service manager back then.
Uncle Phil died 25/1/2011, Daughter Laraine sent me some memories I can share if you like.I remember the original Haymill and the Garage being built, I can remember Saab’s being road tested up the Bath Road, Service Road, and then being nicked as they got to Berlei! Is there a Hartwells Website? I remember ther,Bro Pete was apprenticed to Phil there but Didn’t come back after his national service he went to work for Uncle Albert but we kept our lorries at Hartwells. Dave Hill
I along with john Jackson started our apprenticeships at haymill at about the same time in 1971, we both experienced the HAYMILL way , be it investment in the company + most of all people, the staff in general were the best.
With reference to Dennis Dawson he was by far the best manager that i served under .I now own a very successful independent garage est over 30 years
As for Jim Muir who also was a great foreman he did not leave the company but was sacked due to breaking company rules. Haymill Motors under the guidance
of Geogre Bates ( Mr Bates as we knew him ) was a wonderful experience of which I carry with me TODAY. Thank You
ps Most former employees of HAYMILL have moved on and achieved there potential in life. I for one have certainly done so. THANK YOU MR BATES AND
DENNIS DAWSON.
JOHN The challenging one
I worked for Geo Bate,as a mechanic at his garage on the bath road,Cippenham,Slough,on Simca’s,in the early sixties, one day he told myself,George Ambler and Alan? can’t remember Alan’s last name that he was going to start importing a Swedish car called a SAAB and that one would be arriving shortly,when it arrived and we lifted the bonnet our first remarks was WTF is that, looking at the tiny 3 cylinder engine,but it was a nice car and we were told that the three of us were going to work at the new garage he was having built just for Saab’s,anyhow he had a garage built on Buckingham Ave, Slough Trading Estate,Slough,the first Haymill motors,later Saab themselves got involved and before long things really started to move we were doing PDI checks and then road testing the cars all around Burnham Beeches they were selling well we were then told that Haymill Motors were moving and a new garage was being built in Farnham Commen,and that Saab GB,was moving across the road to a new building and myself,George and Alan,would no longer be working for Geo Bate but SAAB GB,Phil Hill would be the manager and Denis Dawson our works foreman,we used to time ourselves on how quickly we could change engine and gearbox units we got it down to just over 20 min to strip out and refit and fire her up.
We also tuned engines stage 1-2-3-and 4, using dental drills, grinding out and polishing the ports,and fitting 3 Amal carburetors,Erik Carlsson would bring his car in for us to check it over before going on rallies in the UK and also Pat moss they used to have a disagreement on how we should set their suspensions up Erik wanted height so would run on standard size springs with Conni shocks while Pat would have us drop her suspension,
That was a long time ago I suppose you could say that myself,George,and Alan were the first SAAB mechanic’s in England,sad that SAAB are no longer with us…
I was the Service Receptionist at Haymill Motors from October 1970 to January 1972. Besides dealing with service customers, I liaised with other Saab dealers and handled the processing of warranty claims for the various franchises which were Saab, Daf, BMW and for a short while Honda at that time. Phil Hill was the Service Manager and Denis Dawson, well never really knew what he did except to suck up to George Bate’s mates, try to look important, generally disrupt the smooth running of the workshops and talk about “Maggie”. However, Phil Hill and his wife left to run a B&B in Paignton Devon, (went to stay with them in the summer of 1971) and I learnt that he had gone back after I had left. During this time Denis was made Service Manager, deep joy!!!!!!!. A jovial Scotsman named Jim Muir joined as workshop foreman and we worked well as a team when allowed. Once, when the Dawson was on holiday and Jim and I were free to load and run the workshops together without interference, the “Non productive hours” (a measure of how efficient garage workshops are) dropped to a record low for two weeks then went back to their usual. The guys in the workshop were happier too, and some even commented that they wished it could always be like it.
Other notable staff members were Norman who operated the lube bay. Doug Lockyer or “Pin” as he was affectionately known due to his physical resemblance to a split pin. He was the Sales Manager. There were two other salesmen, one was avuncular, rotund and with a big bushy beard, I can not accurately recall their names. Most of the people who John (Jacko) Jackson mentions I remember well especially Alan Warmsley, Bill Porter, and John Springett who was the top Daf mechanic and an ace with the Variomatic transmission system fitted to the Daf 33, 44, and 55. Who could forget the Parts Manager Jack ?????? a vertically challenged guy with bottle lens glasses. George’s son, “Master Bates”, I recalled was only involved with go karts when I was there..
I left Haymill in 1972 as Dennis was a Pain in the ???? to join Hoover as a field service engineer and promoted to Area Service Manager 18 months later. Sometime in the late 1990,s I met up with someone professionally who had a Haymill Saab coaster. I mentioned to him that I used to work for Haymill, and could I “burgle” it. He kindly consented, and it is now currently protecting the top of my desk from a hot coffee mug as I type this.
On a visit back, I learnt that Jim Muir had left for the same reason I did
The pub across the road was the Royal Oak run by a guy called Digby ?????
Pleased to have been able to be part of this site.
Chris.
I was fortunate to be an apprentice at Haymill Motors from 1971 – 1976. Like many people, I suspect, I did not realize at the time how excellent the facilities were and how good we had it being able to attend college for free etc and drive fast cars really fast (ask Willie Townsend -140mph plus in a beemer on the M40!).
Thank you for an excellent page, the only thing I would add was the addition of mazda in the mid ’70’s. They made quite an impression with their efficient design, and I was lucky enough to repair/build the rotary engines. I also think they were Honda dealers before I was there, I remember hearing stories of the S800 sports car.
Here are some of the people I remember (In no particular order);
George Bate, Peter Bate, Norman Armstrong, Norman the forecourt manager, Alan Warmsley, John Fosdyke ,John Gardener, JohnFurnell, John Springett, John Healy (used to drag race motorcycles) , John ?( with the lotus engined Anglia) Jim Pettit, Rosie, Stella,Willie Townsend (one of the best mechanics I was priveliged to work with) Ragvinda Dhuga (emigrated to Canada, I believe) Suri Singh, Bill Porter and his son ? Porter, Steve ? I think in the reception, Bill Smith,Denis Dawson, Phil Hill, of course Bob Overshot, Bob O’Riley(?) and many others I can’t put a name to. With so many Johns, it wasn’t surprising they called me Jacko ! I’ll always remember Christmas eve’s when we’d all go in the accounts and have drinks. George would always give us a very large pork pie and a half bottle of sherry.
I remember the hours were long at first, Saturday mornings as well, I remember the “Bun-Run” to the shop for morning tea break (in a smoked filled tea room!)
Us apprentices going to the Farnham Road secretly between 4:30 – 6pm to get food. Also having rather too much to drink at the Pub across the road (Royal something)
Thanks, Jacko