Corgi Chipperfield’s. Part Two – The Next Generation....

The next part of the story looks at the releases in the last couple of decades. It is an interview from 1995 with Adrienne Fuller, the Research and Development Designer for the Company and the person responsible for the more recent Chipperfield’s range, at Mattel Corgi in Leicester.

Q Adrienne, would you like to give the some background into why the decision was made to revive the Chipperfield name.
A The first reason why we chose Chipperfelds is because of our past link with the family and the circus, and the phenomenal success of the first Chipperfield’s vehicles. Everybody knows how collectible they are now and what they are fetching at auction if they are in mint boxed condition. That is basically why we chose Chipperfield’s. We went into circus vehicles because it was an area of road transport that hadn’t been covered over the last few years by Corgi and there are so many interesting vehicles and opportunities for colourful and interesting liveries around the country.

Q It was a commercial reason then?
A It was a commercial reason yes.

Q What were the feelings of the Chipperfield’s family about seeing their name on the sides of Corgi Models again?
A The member of Chipperfield’s family that we dealt with was Mr Richard Chipperfield, who was extremely pleased that we decided to relaunch the Chipperfields range. Without him we couldn’t have done it. He was extremely helpful providing old photographs, old programmes, posters and some fantastic reference material whenever we called in to see him, which was quite regularly.

Q I guess he saw it as a public relations exercise?
A Yes, I suppose he did but there are still members of the family involved in the circus business. Mr Chipperfield’s two sons are involved with Ringling Brothers and Barnum Bailey in the States and they are providing Chipperfield trained animal acts from what is the most famous circus in the world.

Q Actually these new models have increased interest in the originals and have obviously sent values soaring. Was this part of the intention?
A We knew that the models would be highly collectable because of the success of the original models, but probably not to the extent that they have been. Obviously the original models were intended for children, made as toys and therefore meant to be played with. So there are very few around now where the boxes still exist and the models are in mint condition, which is the main reason why they have become so collectable. I would imagine that the majority of today’s models will not be played with by children and obviously more of them will survive so they won’t increase in value to the extent that the original sets did.

Q I think that is very true. How much work went into research for the 12 models picked and how long did it take?
A Colin Hill and I originally went to see Mr Chipperfield and he provided us with original photographs plus we did have a number of circus books. I also received help from various publications, The World’s Fair and the Showman’s Fellowship. A number of people were very helpful, but mainly Mr Chipperfield himself and members of his family. Colin and I went down once every three months over a period of a year to ask for more information about his original posters and chat to him about the various colour schemes and types of vehicles.

Q Which was the hardest to work on and why?
A I don’t think any of them caused that much aggravation. Probably the most difficult as far as decoration was concerned, was the Flat sided Pole Truck which appears with the caravan. Such a high level of decoration with all the reduced original Chipperfield’s posters that decorate it. Some of the models are based on actual vehicles while others simply have the Chipperfield livery.

Q So some of them represent vehicles they actually operated, but others were simply using the existing casting?
A It is correct. For example, we know the circus did use a number of old buses and coaches that were turned into living quarters, fire vehicles, towing vehicles, all sorts of things and we wanted to introduce one of our coaches into the range as a living quarters vehicle. Basically, Mr Chipperfield said that they had so many over the years he couldn’t tell us what colours they were because they were any colour that anybody decided to paint them. Quite often when a panel got dented another panel from a different vehicle was put on it, not necessarily the same colour, so we tried to represent that sort of thing with the AEC Regal coach. Which I think has turned out very well.

Q What is today’s cost for tooling up for a new casting from start to actual production?
A For an average commercial I would say between £60 - 90,000. Depending on complex the casting is.

Q That would be one of the average lorries’s for instance the Chipperfield’s range?
A Yes.

Q That is quite a commitment for Corgi, especially with the Chipperfield’s Circus isn’t it?
A That is right. Sometimes the collectors don’t realise this, but when we bring out a new model we have to look into the possibility of changing the top part of the casting or another part of the casting and adding on different variations so that we can get a number of different models out of it. For example, a lot of tooling in the Chipperfield’s range, The Pole Truck for instance can be produced with the pole showing as an open pole truck, or a completely flat sided vehicle. That was, with the minimum amount of tooling to put the variation in, but it gives us two slightly different models. Fortunately we have got a number of different cabs in the range now so that we can change those. Although some collectors say well it’s just a change of grille, or it is just a change of cab, to make the product financially viable we have to do that. We also have to be sure that the models in the Chipperfield range can be used in future Corgi ranges under different guises, not necessarily a circus but maybe a fairground, other circuses and in the general road transport range. The caravan being the exception to this, as it can only really fit into a circus or fairground theme. So that it is limited, but we thought the outlay was worth it. The Chipperfield’s range would not be the Chipperfield’s range without a Showman’s caravan.

Q No, you are probably right there, any specific reason why 12 and these specific 12?
A We decided to have a start and end to the range because a lot of collectors only have so much to spend and collectors do like it when you tell them when the start and finish is. We felt that the collector should not have to spend more than £300 for a complete range. This is what it would cost the collector at the normal price if they go to their retailer. But we wanted to make it something really special so I think to do that we needed 12 models and that makes it one a month for a year which is a good balance. I think if it had been any smaller it wouldn’t have been so special. If it had been any bigger it would have been beyond people’s reach.

Q A couple of interesting questions have come up. Some new castings are there, there are some existing castings and there is one old casting. Why that combination?
A Obviously it couldn’t all be new castings; it was not financially viable for a completely new range. So we had to use a lot of the castings that are already in the range. We decided that we would need to inject a large quantity of new tooling into it otherwise we tend to get people saying “Oh well it is just all their existing models re-liveried again”. So we chose to do the Pole Truck, which is a completely new model, but utilising current cabs. The caravan as I said is completely new. The Pole Truck can also be the Pole Trailer which is another new casting, of course the Scammell as a ballast or a generator, there are lot of different guises for that and the crane is new. The only reason the horse box was brought in because it was one of the few pieces of original tooling that still existed that fitted in with the range. Although it was to a slightly different scale, we felt that basically all in all, it wasn’t that far out.

Q What happened to the other original castings?
A A lot of the castings from the original Corgi factory no longer exist. When Swansea Bay was enlarged, they sunk large concrete blocks into the bay to stop the tide water coming in, a lot of the old Corgi tooling was sunk into those blocks to weight it down, that is where a lot of the original Corgi tooling lies, at the bottom of Swansea Bay. The rest is stored in a couple of warehouses, it is catalogued to an extent, but basically we know of some items that we have the tooling for but the tooling is worn out, but the horsebox we did have all the pieces for it and they were in pretty good shape.

Q So if you are a skin diver and a collector, Swansea is the place to go?
A If you can lift a three tonne concrete block out of the sea!

Q Was there anything thought of that was actually rejected for whatever reason that you can remember?
A One thing that was thought of and supported by many collectors was that we include plastic animals with the models. Years ago when Corgi produced the Chipperfields Circus, a lot of popular Corgi models had animals with them and it increased the collectability, if you have got all the bits and pieces that went with the original. If you have a lion missing then it is not worth as much. There were two main reasons we didn’t produce animals. One reason was to produce a very good plastic animal say to the quality of Britains, or something similar, would add an awful lot of cost onto the product and we felt that a lot of collectors would say they just collect models, and don’t want plastic animals. And so you have the difference between the original being produced as toys and these being produced for collectors. This was one reason and we didn’t want to put rubbishy, cheap animals in. Secondly, there is a lot of controversy about using animals in circuses, which we felt we didn’t want to be inviting, so that was another reason we didn’t have animals. Plus the fact that the original Corgi models had opening features which you could put your animals in and out of and the only one you could do that with is the horsebox.

Q Why haven’t the others got opening features?
A Corgi Classics as a whole do not have opening features. We believe that the collector does not want opening features on his or her models.

Q That is the decision that is made for the whole range, not just for Chipperfields?
A It has been made basically for the whole range. Over the years we have formed that opinion. Possibly we are wrong. Collectors are welcome to air their views and I am sure that there are a number who would like opening features, but we feel that it is more suitable for toys.

Q The challenge has been set down?
A Okay.

Q I understand that you are going to add some figures later on in the year. They were displayed at the Trade Fair?
A Yes we are. But I don’t know all the details, Graham Ward of Promod is producing them and initially they will only be available via our Direct Mail Department.

Q What has been the response from the trade for the models. This should be very predictable actually?
A Excellent, they all want more. We have had all our customers try to increase their quota. I think they all put an order in to begin with and thought “Oh well I will see”, but from word of mouth it has got pretty wild and of course everybody is ringing up trying to increase their orders and we cannot do it. We have produced 12,500 of each model and that is it, it is finished.

Q Worldwide isn’t it?
A It is worldwide.

Q What is the split, UK and the rest of the world?
A The split for the 12 models is 8,500 pieces for the UK, 1,500 pieces for direct mail and 2,500 for Europe and the rest of the world.

Q No, not a lot for the rest of the world?
A No it is not really.

Q Which one stands out more than any, which so far have people gone crazy about?
A So far the Scammell Crane has been very popular, also the ERF Flatbed Truck. The latter is doing extremely well, although it is probably one of the plainest models of the whole lot. I think that could be possibly due to the success of the Eddie Stobart Flatbed when that went on sale.

Q Another reason is because there are a lot of commercial collectors which aren’t necessarily Chipperfield collectors?
A That is correct.

Q Which is your favourite?
A I do like the AEC Truck Trailer which has been made to have cages in the side which should be the final release. I like it because every circus that you see have these cage trucks and it was quite interesting working with Len Mills on ways of how we could manage to put the cages in the side. It was quite a tricky operation to be able to do that.
So that was probably the trickiest model operation that we have done. I do, personally like the caravans. I think they are fabulous and we will see other liveries on this fairground theme at a later date.

Q Fairground theme?
A Possibility.

Q Considering 12,500 have been made of each one they quickly increase in price and disappear no doubt due to a little bit of hoarding?
A It is quite possible that some of the retailers might hold a few back, but that is of course unknown to Corgi and beyond Corgi’s control. I understand if collectors think some of the retailers are doing that and are a little disgruntled because they cannot get hold of models, especially if they do appear on the market at a later date at inflated prices. But Corgi does not have any control on what the retailers do with their models when they sell them and basically when it comes down to it, all our retailers are in business like anybody else.

Q Some models are released due to demand from the collector to some extent. So dare I say Corgi listen to the collectors far more than most companies do?
A I personally receive about 50 letters a week from collectors. Susan Pownell from the Collectors Club also passes on to me any interesting suggestions for the range. She probably hands over to me another 30 letters a week and Amanda Fernandez in Special Markets also gets a number of suggestions for the range. They are all read, including any photographs or reference material people sent in and if we think it is of no use whatsoever, it is returned to the person along with the letter. If we think it is a possibility for a future range I keep it in my archive, which you can see behind you, very extensive.
Any good suggestions are kept on file. A number of models and liveries that we have produced have come straight from the collectors. Over the years I have had hundreds of letters from collectors saying “Why don’t we re-produce the Chipperfields models”, probably most of them meant “Why don’t we re-release the originals”.

Q Like you did with Chitty Chitty Bang Bang?
A Precisely, thinking that we still had the tooling for them all. I can assure you that if we did have the tooling for the old Chipperfields it would have probably been done a while ago, but we don’t have it.

Q I think that answers quite a few questions for collectors out there. Now this is an interesting question. You have partly answered it I think. Many collectors have started buying figures and animals from other sources to add atmosphere I guess to a possible layout, which they have. For example plastic bales from a company not too distant from us and they seem to be selling very well. The question is would Corgi consider adding accessories coming out to tie in with the Chipperfields circus theme?
A I don’t think we will. There are a number of products on the market from other companies that people can buy today with the models and basically the collector who wants these pieces can get them. We are not in the market to make plastic accessories. We are producing collectable models for adults and children, sorry young adults. I don’t think that we would consider bringing out any accessories.

Q It is an interesting point because other people said “Well okay, you may not bring out the animals and characters or whatever, but wouldn’t it be nice to have a cardboard layout for the circus or even the big top which would be a nice backdrop”?
A It is possible, but I don’t really think so. If you say there are 12,500 people out there with the circus set, I would imagine that only 2,000 of those, if that, would like a cardboard circus layout. The majority of people are serious model collectors and they don’t want bits of cardboard to erect and put together. And none of the collectors I would imagine will even open their boxes and take the models out. They will just put them away in the loft and forget about them.

Q Have you opened yours?
A No, I haven’t.

Q There are some cabinet makers starting to produce cabinets to display the Chipperfields models in. And as we haven’t seen any yet, neither of us can comment on them, for example Picture Pride Displays and Collection Displays near Driffield. That seems like an interesting development dare I say?
A We do actually use a couple of companies that produce cabinets. Our Direct Mail Department deals with a company and advertises their products in its catalogue. It is not something that Corgi would ever do. As I said before we are in the business of producing die-cast models. There are a number of companies around which produce excellent display cabinets and would produce them made to measure for a Chipperfields set if somebody wanted one in particular. There is no reason that Corgi would get involved in producing anything like that.

Q Do you personally feel that is a likely possibility that more models will be made in the Chipperfields livery at a later date?
A We have no plans in the next two years and personally I don’t think we will be producing any more Chipperfields vehicles. There are a number of other circuses which could be represented on these models and I don’t think we will do anything on the scale of Chipperfields again. It has got to be kept as something special. So even if we do produce other circus models in the future, they won’t be on the proportion that the Chipperfields set is made. It will only be a couple of models in a certain livery or single model. There won’t be another Chipperfields set.

Q So for the foreseeable future, what you see is what you will get?
A Yes.

Read more about Chipperfields in Part 3, in the August Newsletter, just as a little tease we will be comparing the old and new versions.

Click here to see the fantastic range of Chipperfields Items we have on offer.