Men Who Make Transport
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Rowla]
turice Cole
XPORT," Mr. Harold Macmillan is reported to have said, " is fun." Having seen exporters at . work in trying climates and tough circumstances. I would agree that what they are up to is fun in the sense that everything one likes doing has an essential element of fun. But if the connotation of the word includes "easy "no, not that.
And I have authoritative support for this view. I asked Maj. Rowland Maurice (" Bon ") Cole, managing director of Metropolitan-Cammell-Weymann, Ltd., about it. After all, he is as high-powered and top-level a salesman as one could wish to find: he has been through the mill and knows most of the answers. "Jolly hard work," he commented. "And not always fun at that."
" Bon " Cole speaks with knowledge and wit of what is involved in selling British commercial vehicles overseas in the teeth of determined, skilled and growing competition from the United States, Germany and Italy. Nowadays, much of the preliminary part of .his company's overseas selling is carried out by senior members of his staff, he being called in only for negotiations at the topmost level.
But he did not come into the company at the top. Back in 1937 he joined Metropolitan-Cammetl-Weymann in a fairly subordinate capacity on the technical sales side. Selling suits him. One might almost say that, with his debonair manner, humorous yet serious conversational style and general air of being so glad to see you, he is a born salesman. Yet this is not to imply superficiality—far from it. He may be able to mix with ambassadors, Ministers and industrialists on terms of social equality and, no doubt, is eminently clubbable: his senior position in the commercial vehicle industry is built firmly upon sound technical knowledge acquired in an orthodox way.
From Alleyn's School and the Northampton Polytechnic he joined the Associated Equipment Co., Ltd., as an apprentice, serving with them first at Walthamstow and finally, when for a short time it became the Associated Daimler Co., Ltd., at Southall. Then he joined Arthur Twidle as junior engineer of the British Electrical Federation, as it then was, leaving him as chief assistant to join the company of which he is now managing director.
Engineer Trained So his background is that of an engineer. Is that necessary when doing some hard selling in Argentina, the
Caribbean, Africa? "Bon " Cole declines, modestly, to state categorically that it is essential, but he is certain it is a help. Unless you know a good deal about the technicalities of your product you are in no position to answer intelligently some of the difficult questions prospective customers are sure to ask and which, quite often, have been put into their mouths by your rivals. He pointed out that American manufacturers are apt to send their salesmen overseas in teams, every member of which is a specialist in his particular line. We do not do things in that way, relying upon the knowledge and mental agility of the trusted few representing us in foreign parts. But how much those trusted few are expected to know, and how mentally gymnastic they must be!
I had almost used the word ruse—unflattering in one sense but when used of Rowland Cole apt and complimentary, I think. For consider how he spent the war years. As an engineer, the Royal Armoured Corps seemed his natural sphere when he joined up in 1940. Posted to the Middle East with the 4th Battalion R.T.R., he swiftly rose to the rank of major, was awarded the Military Cross and was twice Mentioned in Despatches. At Tobruk the Italians captured but couldn't hold him. He escaped from a prisoner-of-war camp in Italy and forthwith set himself up as a man about town in Milan.
"I had a wonderful time," he told me, "Plenty of money in my pocket, good Italian tailor-mades from British cloth imported through Switzerland, and you fellows at home were paying me my major's rates and allowances."
Twice "in the Bag" He also rented a comfortable flat. Ruse? Judge how appropriate is the adjective when I report that for 11 months he worked in this way in close contact with the Italian Resistance until the Gestapo caught up with him, nearly had him shot because of his difficulty in establishing his identity as a British officer, and finally packed him off for some uncomfortable months to Germany.
Back from the wars in June, 1945, he rejoined Metropolitan-Cammell-Weymann, becoming a director in 1950 and managing director six years.later. Since 1945 he has been in travels oft—though none so exciting or perilous, I warrant, as his trips through the Milan streets in wartime Italy—particularly through South America, where his company have been markedly successful, and in the Caribbean, where he has lately achieved not only sales in Cuba, but good hard cash as well.
When I asked him which he counted most valuable, he found it difficult to reply, but, harking back, thought the technical mission he led through the U.S.A. was very useful. It was that tour which resulted in his company's development, together with Leyland Motors, Ltd., of the integral vehicle which has since been so successful overseas.
"My company export five times as many bus bodies as any other British bodybuilder," he told me, "and are certainly among the most advanced in research." And he proudly adds that this has been achieved with little detriment to the home market. H.C.