Binns Road closes the gates for the last time.

When the factory closed,
John 12 years old son of a Meccano worker wrote this poem.[img] / images / sites / default / files / old - forum - images / _Poem.png [/img]

Thanks Jacques ! I wonder how much is known about the very end ? I ' ve heard all sorts of stories,
and know that relations between workers
and management were very poor indeed.The late ' 70 ' s in Britain were rife with industrial action sadly.I ' ve heard stories of Airfix bringing in new machines,
but because they would have required less labour to run them,
and therefore redundancies,
that they were never used
and strike action resulted.What do we know about the workers occupying the factory in the sit in ? it ' s easy to look back now
and think more should have been documented,
but if the closure of Austin Rover in Birmingham a few years ago is anything to
go
by access to the works would have been difficult,
and quite dangerous as feelings were indeed running high,
and lots of people were out of work.Chris Warr.

Packaging Room,
Meccano,
Binns Road,
Liverpool,
April 1967 [img] / images / sites / default / files / old - forum - images / UMRC4OD9.jpg [/img] Cartons of Dinky Toys awaiting despatch to various overseas destinations.Note the cartons destined for Paris,
Dallas / Houston,
Melbourne
and Sydney.[img] / images / sites / default / files / old - forum - images / 735IL4V3.jpg [/img]

Bruce,
These are great pictures,
do you have many more ?
Where
do they come
from
? Are they publishable ?

Chris So you live 150 miles
from
Liverpool
and have never been to Binns Road ? Shame,
shame ! You will have to plan on a holiday to that vibrant city,
and if possible take with you any photographs you can find showing the exterior of the factory beside Binns Road,
and see if you can match the same spot today.I have now
set
your homework for your next holiday ! :laugh: Bruce (150)

Hi Bruce,
it ' s even worse than that mate,
I trade at the Chester Toyfair,
and
from
there it ' s 41mins to Binns Rd according to good old Google maps.I ' ve even got Dinky ' s with me in the van.Rest assured I ' m on it next time ! CW.

Hi Bruce,
it ' s even worse than that mate,
I trade at the Chester Toyfair,
and
from
there it ' s 41mins to Binns Rd according to good old Google maps.I ' ve even got Dinky ' s with me in the van.Rest assured I ' m on it next time ! CW.

Further to my previous posts,
after
Binns Road,
my family
and I went in search of
where
the Beatles actually performed for the first time that started them on the road of fame.Not the Cavern,
but the Casbah Coffee Club that was located in the basement of the Beatle ' s first drummer.Pete Best.Mrs Best had encouraged her son
and had created the coffee club,
but in 2005 we had no idea of the house number.Well we eventually found Haymans Green
and drove up
and down the street expecting to see a plaque
or some recognition of the significance of this location,
but nothing.Thanks to modern Google I now know it to have been 8 Haymans Green .While searching for this street,
we were continually hampered with the quaint way the British ' signpost ' their roads,
lanes,
streets,
etc;on a wall,
house,
hidden by bushes,
trees
or in many instances,
simply non - existent ! By the way,
those were the days without Navman,
Garmin,
Tom Tom.I downloaded directions
from
the AA
and printed them out before leaving Australia.My eldest daughter then acted as our navigator,
reading these directions
and checking with the little map I had also downloaded,
but still we were at the mercy of non - existent
or carefully hidden street signs ! Chris - so there will hopefully be more Dinky Toys returning to their birthplace in the not - too - distant future ? Good one - so hope your visit is the start of a stampede ! I might have to bring more of the little fellows with me to match the numbers you take along ! ! :laugh: Bruce (150) 24 August 2014

dinkycollect wrote: An application form for the DTCA Dinky Toys Club of America was printed under the hanging box of the 1979 cost reduced US re-issue of the G.M.C. Brinks truck. I use the words hanging box so that this type of packing can not be mistaken for the Visi-Pac, both of them are often called window boxes which is confusing. As for the closure of the factory, the foreing agents were certainly not aware of the bad state in which the company was. In 1970, consultants were called in to improve the profitability. Their proposals were rejected at every level from the management down to the workers and mainly the six unions who were running the shops. The decision to close the factory may have been taken as late as the day before the closing. On November 30th the manager of Airfix turned up at the factory and simply said : we close down to-night. The unions organised a sitting which lasted until March 1980 but this did not help and the factory was demolished soon after. If you want to read the whole story, this is the book that you need, available on Amazon and probably on order at your local book shop. '[/i] Jacques Your above Post on Meccano's Dinky Toys Club Thread brought to mind an article I wrote 15 years ago. The following is the article from my DINKY NEWS Issue 10 September 2000 that covers the demise of the company from another perspective. Apart from the staff being notified on 30 November 1979, but a memo went out to all of Meccano's clients advising that Meccano Limited would cease manufacturing as of 30 November 1979. That memo, signed by Ray McNiece, Managing Director, was dated 30 November 1979. I will include a copy of this memo on this Thread later. Regards Bruce (150) #606 8 June 2015

Bruce, Thank you for duplicating my post to this thread. I was not aware of it's existance. Thank you also for posting your very interesting article which complements Kenneth Brown's excellent book which is well worth the

Jacques It was very fortunate and timely that Kenneth Brown, seven years after his article had appeared in the British journal, Economic History Review, he enlarged on it and wrote that fascinating account of the 'FACTORY OF DREAMS', the story of Meccano Limited. (I presume it was just a typo when you wrote 'Worse' instead of 'Worth'!!) I highly recommend this book to all who are collectors of Dinky Toys. With Meccano being a large part of the industrial and personal history of Liverpool, it is most unusual that nothing has been done by the civic authorities in that city to mark the location of this world-famous factory. There must have been literally thousands of people, mainly women, who worked at Meccano at some stage in their lives. During our visit to Binns Road, I had to 'guestimate' exactly where the factory stood. There was no problem with The Railway Hotel, as this famous Meccano watering hole was still there although under a different guise. Kind regards Bruce (150) #619 11 June 2015

Bruce-- First, thanks for sharing your earlier article on the demise of Meccano. I had purchased Brown's book a few years ago, and your observations that were summwrized tie in very nicely with his. It is hard not to be melancholy whenever I read about this sad time; such an inglorius end to a beloved and well known firm, that had for so long been the leader in the diecast toy field. I second your thought that any serious Dinky collector should read his book. Besides the sad end, there is much more to learn about Frank Hornby and the company. It also reminds of a very similar, sad ending, at almost the same time, for another well known company, and a contemporary of Hornby and Meccano......A.C. Gilbert Co., makers of the American Erector Set and American Flyer Trains. I had, and still have, several childhood American Flyer train sets, and at an early age took an interest in them second only to my Dinky's. Much the same kind of management and market problems befell Gilbert in the early to mid 1960's, with A.C. Gilbert himself still running the company as a very old man, until he finally turned it over to his son way too late. In a matter of a very few years, two old, well known toy companies bit the dust. By the way, I learned recently that the Gilbert Co. had, for a short time, become the U.S. distributor for Meccano, after their long association with H.Hudson ended around 1960 or so. I also wonder how that termination happened.....did Dobson see the handwriting on the wall and simply get early, or was Meccano ready for a change? Regards, Terry