LEC Refrigeration, known by its full title as Longford Engineering Company Refrigeration, is a British company manufacturing refrigerators and freezers.

History

It was formed in 1942, by fishmongers Frank Purley and his brother Charles Reginald Purley (born 1910 in Twickenham) as Longford Engineering Company Ltd. Charles had moved to Bognor in 1929. It began making munitions for the war on ''Longford Road'' in Bognor, but began making experimental refrigerators from 1945. It made its first fridge in 1946, the year the ''Shripney Road'' site was obtained, with production beginning in 1947. The name was changed to LEC Refrigeration on 13 December 1954. Around 60% of its products were for the domestic market, with the rest for commercial use. Before 1956, it was selling more products abroad than in the United Kingdom. It was based at the Shripney Works, a fourteen-acre site at Bersted in the north of

Bognor Regis Bognor Regis (), sometimes simply known as Bognor (), is a town and seaside resort in West Sussex on the south coast of England, south-west of London, west of Brighton, south-east of Chichester and east of Portsmouth. Other nearby to ...

in Sussex, off ''Shripney Road'' ( A29) next to the

Bognor Regis branch line The Bognor Regis branch line is a short branch railway line in West Sussex. It is a branch of the West Coastway Line, a main line railway running from Brighton to Portsmouth and Southampton. The branch forms a trailing connection with the ...

. On the other side of the railway, it had 56 acres of land, part of which was used as its own airfield. Charles Purley would be the company's chairman for many years until October 1991. The airfield, ICG code EGKC with an asphalt surface had its last known movements C172 in 2007, from 2013 a Self Launching motor Glider G-GCRV with kind permission on SDLL has been operating there, more recently the Airfield was purchased by BR Aviation Ltd July 2016, where upon Bognor Gliding Club was accepted into membership into the British Gliding Association in October same year, the airfield is marked on all the databases & CAA maps as an active Gliding club www.brgc.co.uk By 1960, only 13% of homes in the United Kingdom had a refrigerator, compared to 96% in the United States. Around that time Lec produced its ''Twelve Six'' range of fridges, costing £179 each. In 1970, the Co Op (

Co-operative Wholesale Society A co-operative wholesale society, or CWS, is a form of co-operative federation (that is, a co-operative in which all the members are co-operatives), in this case, the members are usually consumer cooperatives. According to co-operative economi ...

) decided to produce its own range of freezers, manufactured by Lec, which retailed at £93. In 1973, it opened a factory in Northern Ireland. In the 1970s, its freezers were the ''

Which? ''Which?'' is a United Kingdom brand name that promotes informed consumer choice in the purchase of goods and services by testing products, highlighting inferior products or services, raising awareness of consumer rights and offering independ ...

'' best buys. By the beginning of the 1980s, it had around 1,600 employees, and had around 20% of the domestic refrigeration market in the United Kingdom. Its products had the ''Regis'' suffix, to denote where they were made, but by now had a northern site in

Burnley, Lancashire Burnley () is a town and the administrative centre of the wider Borough of Burnley in Lancashire, England, with a 2001 population of 73,021. It is north of Manchester and east of Preston, at the confluence of the River Calder and River Brun ...

. By the 1980s, the company was known as LEC Refrigeration plc, an LSE listed company. In March 1993, the company laid off staff, and its workforce dropped to below 1,000, when it decided to import its compressors from Denmark instead of making them itself. From 1994, a new £35 million computerised factory was built on the neighbouring New Era industrial estate. From August 2005, production of domestic fridges was moved to Whiston at a site off the A57 near Whiston Hospital, run by Glen Dimplex Home Appliances. The Bognor site has been redeveloped into a

Sainsbury's J Sainsbury plc, trading as Sainsbury's, is the second largest chain of supermarkets in the United Kingdom, with a 14.6% share of UK supermarket sales. Founded in 1869 by John James Sainsbury with a shop in Drury Lane, London, the company w ...

. The factory is due to be demolished in mid-2011.

Special product division

From 1956, it opened its special products division which made fridges for hospitals, aircraft and laboratories. This is now the leading manufacturer of these types of refrigerators in the United Kingdom, trading as Lec Medical and Lec Commercial. Production of specialist fridges continued at Bognor from 2005 to 2007, but production finally finished at Bognor Regis on 19 April 2007. The division is now owned by Glen Dimplex Professional Appliances.

Motor racing

LEC Refrigeration Racing LEC was a UK motor racing team and Formula One constructor based at Bognor Regis, West Sussex. They participated in ten Grands Prix using a March in and their own car, the LEC CRP1, in . Formula One 1973 In David Purley hired a March 731 ...

was formed by the company in the 1970s out of The

Bee and Cee Rally Championship Bees are winged insects closely related to wasps and ants, known for their roles in pollination and, in the case of the best-known bee species, the western honey bee, for producing honey. Bees are a monophyletic lineage within the superfam ...

of the LEC Car Club which started in the 1950's and awarded a silver cup annually. Winners included B.Orme and M.Campbell in 1960 and L.A.Humphries in 1965. one of the more famed drivers was

David Purley David Charles Purley, GM (26 January 1945 – 2 July 1985) was a British racing driver born in Bognor Regis, West Sussex, who participated in 11 Formula One World Championship Grands Prix, debuting at Monaco in 1973. Purley is best known ...

, known for the

1973 Dutch Grand Prix The 1973 Dutch Grand Prix was a Formula One motor race held at Zandvoort on July 29, 1973. It was race 10 of 15 in both the 1973 World Championship of Drivers and the 1973 International Cup for Formula One Manufacturers. Zandvoort returned to t ...

, and son of the company's founder.

Ownership

It became a public company on 1 September 1964. In 1988, the company had a turnover of £56 million, making a £4 million profit. Charles Purley died in December 1991. He had been appointed an OBE in the 1986

New Years Honours List The New Year Honours is a part of the British honours system, with New Year's Day, 1 January, being marked by naming new members of orders of chivalry and recipients of other official honours. A number of other Commonwealth realms also mark thi ...

Sime Darby

On 21 July 1994, it was bought by

Sime Darby Sime Darby Berhad () is a Malaysian trading conglomerate. Its core businesses operate and serve in the industrial, motors and logistics sectors as well as the healthcare, and insurance segments. Background The modern Sime Darby Berhad corp ...

of Malaysia. The company was valued at around £21 million, making around 300,000 units a year. In the beginning of the 1990s, prior to its sale, the company had been making a £3 million loss. By 1997, it claimed to be No.2 in the United Kingdom, with a 15% share, after

Hotpoint Hotpoint is a British brand of domestic appliances. Ownership of the brand is split between American company Whirlpool, which has the rights in Europe, and Chinese company Haier, which has the rights in the Americas through its purchase of ...

with 18%.

Glen Dimplex

On 26 February 2005, it was bought by the Irish company

Glen Dimplex GlenDimplex (formerly known as Glen Electric) is an Irish based consumer electrical goods firm headquartered in Dublin, Ireland. The company is privately held, with manufacturing and development centres in the Republic of Ireland, the United King ...

Structure

Commercial operations are from the Glen Dimplex site at Whiston.

Products

* Fridges * Freezers *

Wine cooler A wine cooler is an alcoholic beverage made from wine and fruit juice, often in combination with a carbonated beverage and sugar. Traditionally home-made, wine coolers have been bottled and sold by commercial distributors since the early 1980 ...

s Some of its energy efficient products are registered for an enhanced capital allowance, which can be written off against taxable profit, as found on

The Carbon Trust The Carbon Trust was developed and launched in 1999-2001 as part of the development of the Climate Change Levy (CCL), a tax on business energy use that still operates today. The Carbon Trust was originally funded by around £50m of tax revenue ge ...

's ''Energy Technology Product List''.

References

External links

LecLec CommercialRedevelopment Of Former SiteBognor In September 2008Tylza Beverage Fridge
{{Authority control British companies established in 1942 Manufacturing companies established in 1942 1942 establishments in England Metropolitan Borough of Knowsley Companies based in Merseyside Companies formerly listed on the London Stock Exchange Home appliance manufacturers of the United Kingdom History of West Sussex Arun District