Everything about Rolls Razor totally explained
Rolls Razor Limited was a
British company, which had two reasons for being known: a sophisticated safety-
razor, and later an "affordable" twin-tub
washing machine.
Origins: razor
The eponymous product was a sophisticated safety-
razor which came in a metal box designed to allow the blade to be stropped against the lid and thus wasn't disposable, but unlike the
straight razor it incorporated a safety guard and its size was closer to the early Gillette double blade disposable razor. The company wilted in the face of competition from the likes of
Gillette
Washing machines
After launching his washing machine business on the back of newspaper adverts, entrepreneur
John Bloom bought the moribund shell as a vehicle to grow his business.
Originally the machines were manufactured in
Holland, but later an assembly line was set up at the company’s factory in
Cricklewood, London, where prospective customers could view the process. On the back of a heavy advertising campaign, and prices 50% below those found in shops retailing products by
Hoover and
Hotpoint, the machines were offered on
hire purchase in light of the
British Government relaxing many restrictions on this type of
finance. By 1962, Rolls had secured 10% of the market and was the third largest manufacturer of washing machines. Keen to further expand the business, it merged with the Colston company, founded by ex-Hoover director Sir Charles Colston, which made compact
dishwashers, and concluded a deal to distribute
Prestcold refrigerators.
The company listed on the
London Stock Exchange in mid-1962, at $3.50, with the price doubling in weeks. By the end of 1963, the company was selling over 200,000 machines a year. Marketing itself as Rolls-Prestcold, in 1963 it became the first commercial sponsor of the
Royal Windsor Horse Show.
But the retailers and UK manufacturers were unhappy, and reduced their prices considerably to create the so-called Washing Machine War, between direct sales and retailers. In response Bloom was forced to increase his advertising costs just as sales began to fall, and was then hit by the 1964 postal strike which resulted in coupon returns drying up. Receipts from Rolls's customer hire purchase agreements were under written by
banker Sir Isaac Wolfson, who by mid-1964 had bankrolled the company with a $28 million loan. Spotting trouble, Sir Isaac withdrew his support and sped the downfall. With Bloom suspected of
malpractice, the companies shares were suspended at $0.15 in mid-July 1964, before the company announced it would be placed into voluntary
liquidation. Rolls Razor was subsequently a respondent company in a
House of Lords judicial decision called
Barclays Bank Ltd v Quistclose Investments. This was a
landmark case which created the
Quistclose trust.
Manufacture continued with machines built by the engineering company Tallent (who built the company's dishwashers), who re-branded them as such briefly, but by 1965 the machines were marketed as Colstons before the appliance division of Tallent was taken over by the
Italian firm
Ariston in 1979.
Further Information
Get more info on 'Rolls Razor'.
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