Sandicliffe Loughborough – History

While Sandicliffe have been in business since back in 1948, our Loughborough story begins in the mid 1960s. Gillotts Garage was already a much loved Loughborough name when we took it over in 1966. The four acre site was rebranded to Sandicliffe and Loughborough drivers were able to buy new and used Fords, have their car repaired, serviced and MOTd and fill up with petrol at the Derby Road filling station. Back in early 1966, the Beatles’ Day Tripper topped the charts, Harold Wilson was Prime Minister and England were still trying to win their first World Cup. Sandicliffe’s Loughborough site was just four acres in size and the biggest selling new cars were Ford’s Anglia, Cortina, Corsair and Zodiac models. One of our biggest early orders was from local business Fisons who purchased 14 Ford Cortinas in the spring of 1966. The used car centre had a great choice of used models. You could have picked up a 1963 Ford Corsair in aqua blue-white for £575, a 1964 Ford Anglia Super in blue for £575 or a 1962 Austin Mini for £280. You could even have snapped up a ‘sold as seen’ 1952 grey Morris Oxford for the princely sum of £20. Tom Barton, one of Sandicliffe’s family directors, said: “Loughborough was Sandicliffe’s third site and we’ve been at this same location in Loughborough for 46 years. Astonishingly, we have four employees today who were with Gillotts when we took them over back in 1966. “An average mechanic would have earned £8 per week when we took over the garage and, as we have grown, we’re now up to around 180 employees on the site. We’ve been an important job creator for Loughborough over the years and our branch’s turnover has increased from £200,000 in 1966 to approaching £30 million in 2012.” Since 1966, the site has significantly grown in size.

A caravan sales building, 23 allotments and three houses have disappeared in the last 46 years as we have grown the site and widened the services we offer to you. While the Loughborough site has been a Ford dealership for almost fifty years, we added a Mazda dealership when the busy petrol station closed in 2010 and a brand new state of the art Nissan showroom in 2012. Mr Barton from Sandicliffe, the new Nissan, Mazda and Ford specialists, added: “Over nearly fifty years, Sandicliffe have been an integral part of Loughborough, employing hundreds of local people and helping thousands with repairs, services and great deals on new and used cars. “Just as the Corsair and Cortina are models of the past, I don’t expect we’ll be selling the new Focus and Fiesta in 46 years from now. Still, Sandicliffe’s Loughborough site continues to go from strength to strength and I look forward to new generations of mechanics and motor specialists maintaining Sandicliffe’s excellent local reputation five decades from now.”