I (Ray Bagnall) started working for a company called Scandia Motor Company straight out of school as a trainee mechanic. Scandia Motor Company was a main dealership for both SAAB and Volvo cars in Birmingham. I started my apprenticeship in motor mechanic in 1966, yes the year of the England world cup win. After six years of training at the firm I successfully completed my apprenticeship in 1972 and went on to work at a number of SAAB main dealers as a mechanic. Bagnall SAAB Limited was incorporated in April 1987 in order to service SAAB cars. Our first premises was located in Tysely Birmingham. We started to get a name for ourselves as a well organised and respected SAAB service centre with very keen prices and technical knowledge second to none. As we started to get a good reputation for our business in and around the Birmingham area, we realised that we had out grown our first premises and needed larger premises. We acquired premises in Hall Green and once again our customer base grow rapidly. By this time, we were getting customers from all over the West Midlands just to get their vehicles serviced or repaired by ourselves. We then moved into new premises in Highgate(1), we were at those particular premises for a number of years and once again we outgrew those premises a lot faster than we ever expected was possible. We had our fastest growth to date at those premises and with even more customers requiring their SAAB vehicles correctly diagnosed and serviced, we decided to move yet again to even larger premises with even more customer parking spaces.
