Pryce Jones

Pryce Jones was a Welsh entrepreneur who created the world's first-ever mail order business. The enterprise began as a drapery shop on Broad Street in Newton, Wales, in 1856. Newton had always had a wool industry and it was the local Welsh flannel which formed the mainstay of Pryce Jones' company.

Post Office reforms and the arrival of the railways in Newton helped turn the small rural concern into a global company. Pryce Jones hit upon a unique method for selling his wares. People would choose what they wanted from leaflets he sent out and the goods would then be dispatched by post and train. It was an ideal way of meeting the needs of customers in isolated rural locations who were either too busy or unable to get into Newton to shop. It was the world's first mail order business and it was to change the nature of retailing throughout the world.

The further expansion of the railways in the years that followed allowed Pryce Jones to take orders from further afield and his company grew rapidly. Large new premises, called the Royal Welsh Warehouse, were built in 1878 to house the expanding business. Pryce Jones was given a knighthood in 1887 for his services to commerce and changed his name to Sir Pryce Pryce-Jones. The Royal Warehouse acquired its own printing press and in 1890 produced its first illustrated catalogue to replace the simple price lists that had been sent out previously.

Pryce-Jones' involvement in the business gradually diminished as his health began to fail and his son Edward took control of the company in 1906. Pryce-Jones died in 1920, his son Edward in 1926. However, the Pryce-Jones family continued to be involved in the running of the company until 1938 when it was taken over by Lewis' department store.

Sir Pryce Pryce-Jones

by Mark Matlach

W.-O. LTD. (Waygood–Otis Ltd.)

Waygood-Otis Ltd. was formed in 1906 following the merger of two lift manufacturing companies called the Otis Lift Co. and R. Waygood & Co.

The Otis Lift Co. was established in New York in 1853 by Elisha Otis. The company pioneered the development of the “safety elevator”, invented by Otis in 1852, which used a special mechanism to lock the elevator car in place should the hoisting ropes fail. This revolutionary design enabled the use of lifts for passengers. On March 23rd 1857, the world's first passenger safety elevator went into service at Broadway and Broome Street in New York. The elevator was powered by steam through a series of shafts and belts.

R. Waygood & Co. was established in London in 1833 by Richard Waygood. The company manufactured water-powered lifts.

Following the merger of the two lift makers, the headquarters of Waygood-Otis in the UK was established in Leicester. The company continued to make advances in lift technology. The “tram car” lift was developed. This was the first lift to have push buttons – at the time most lifts were manually controlled using a handle. In the 1930s the first lifts to have automatic doors were produced. After the Second World War, "Waygood" was dropped from the company name.

In 1976 Otis Ltd. was acquired by United Technologies and is a wholly owned subsidiary. Today, Otis is the world's largest manufacturer of vertical transportation systems, principally focusing on lifts and escalators. 

The tram car lift—so called as the windows at the side made it look like a tram car.

by Mark Matlach

Provincial Insurance Company

The Provincial Insurance Company was founded in 1903 by a wealthy cotton merchant called James Scott. His main objective in forming the company was to create a vehicle that would transmit his wealth to later generations of his family. This intention was fulfilled. The company remained almost entirely in the hands of his descendants and during its first 50 years of operation its gross assets grew more than 150 fold from a substantial initial base.

Until his death in 1913, James Scott controlled his company while his sons served an apprenticeship in the business. Subsequently his elder son Samuel succeeded him as chairman and his younger son Francis succeeded his brother in 1946. Francis Scott's son, Peter, joined the company's management in 1946 and succeeded his father as chairman in 1957. He, in turn was followed in this office in 1977 by Charles Shakerley, a great grandson of the founder.

Initially the Provincial dealt exclusively in fire insurance. Before the First World War the company undertook accident insurance and ventured tentatively into foreign markets. During the War it opened marine insurance and motor insurance departments. After 1920 the Provincial grew rapidly and by 1938 it accepted all forms of insurance (except for life assurance) and was well established in a number of foreign markets. By the outbreak of the Second World War, the Scott family's initial involvement of £75,000 had been converted into a company with an estimated value of over £2 million.

In 1994 the Provincial Insurance Company was acquired by Union des Assurances De Paris (UAP), the largest insurance company in France. Two years later UAP was taken over by a French global insurance group called AXA.

by Mark Matlach

Language Tuition Centre

In 1950, the 11th Duke of Devonshire decided to move out of his family home--an 18th century mansion in Eastbourne, Sussex, called Compton House. In 1954 the Duke allowed a Mr. Schwartz to open a residential language school / finishing school for ladies at Compton House.

The Language Tuition Centre or LTC  Ladies' College of English was highly successful and two more schools were opened in London and Norwich. Over time, fewer and fewer girls dreamed of becoming a “lady”, and demand for LTC's courses declined.

In 1983 LTC admitted its first male students and became a more conventional language school.

In 2010 LTC Eastbourne became the headquarters of the Language Teaching Centres group of schools, which has schools in London and Brighton as well as an affiliated school in Paris.

Compton Park, Eastbourne

by Mark Matlach

H. Rossell & Co.

Henry Rossell & Co. was a company of steel refiners and manufacturers of steel tools established in 1837 at Effingham Road, Sheffield.

In 1914 the company had 150 employees and manufactured steel files, shear blades, machine irons, roller bars, bed plates, knives and drills.

During the 1930s, H. Rossell & Co. was a supplier to the aircraft industry and had offices in Glasgow and London.

The company traded until 1967 when it was acquired by the Tempered Spring Co. Ltd.

Henry Rossell & Co., Wallace Works, Sheffield

by Mark Matlach

Druce & Co. Ltd.

Druce & Co. Ltd. was a large furniture store situated at the corner of Baker Street and Blandford Street in west London. The store was also informally known as “the Baker Street Bazaar”, the site originally being the home of a horse bazaar which extended to carriages and other goods in the 1830s. The furniture store was established in the 1850s by a second hand furniture dealer called Thomas Charles Druce. Druce died in 1864 and his son Herbert took over and ran the business until 1913.

On 8th December 1940 Druce & Co. Ltd. suffered extensive damage following a German bombing raid. The warehouse stock of bedding, furniture, carpets and antiques was largely destroyed. A small part of the building survived and it continued to be used by Druce & Co. until 1956. In 1957 the store was finally demolished and the site was developed as Michael House, serving as the UK headquarters of Marks & Spencer until 2005. The site now forms part of an office complex with adjoining shops and restaurants.

Druce & Co. Ltd. after the Second World War

by Mark Matlach

B W & Co. (Burroughs Wellcome & Co.)

In 1879 two American pharmacists, Silas Burroughs and Henry Wellcome, established a pharmaceutical company in London. At this time there were very few companies in Britain which manufactured drugs and pharmacists still used the traditional time-consuming and less precise pestle and mortar method to prepare medicines. In the United States a mechanized method of making pills had been invented, and Burroughs and Wellcome began importing and selling the compressed pills. Business was good and the company acquired larger offices in Snow Hill in 1883. In the same year a factory was purchased in Wandsworth, south west London, and the company began to manufacture its own pills. The drugs were an instant success in Britain and a bigger factory was established in Dartford which remained the firm's production center until the 1980s.

In 1888, Burroughs Wellcome & Co. developed a new machine that could produce 600 compressed pills a minute, each pill having an unprecedented standard of precision. To eliminate the threat of competition the company registered as a trademark one of the most famous and powerful brand names in business history Tabloid, a word created by blending the words tablet and alkaloid – to denote the company's pills. The name was applied to the full range of the company's products, including tabloid first aid kits and medicine chests, tabloid photographic developer and even tabloid tea. The term has now passed into general use to mean anything in compact form, in particular a newspaper format, though it is still technically the property of Burroughs Wellcome & Co.

Silas Burroughs died in 1895, leaving the company in the hands of his partner.  The business flourished under Henry Wellcome's leadership, expanding massively and setting up several research laboratories which employed some of the most outstanding scientists of the day.

In 1995, Wellcome merged with Glaxo to form Glaxo Wellcome plc. The company merged with SmithKline Beecham in 2000 to form GlaxoSmithKline which is currently the fourth largest pharmaceutical company in the world.

Burroughs Wellcome & Co. Head Office, Snow Hill, London, 1880s

by Mark Matlach