2009: Purnell's new homeSydney’s demographics have changed substantially over the many decades since Purnell started at Arncliffe in 1951. It had become time for Purnell to move about 10 to 15 minutes further south, closer to Sydney’s luxury car belt of the lower St George and Sutherland Shire. After procuring land and designing the first all new facility in over half a century, Purnell opened on King Georges Road Blakehurst in April 2009. We are now extremely convenient to our target market and are proud to say many of our long term customers from, the greater Sydney metropolitan area, NSW south coast, the A.C.T. and even the Hunter valley and northern NSW customers have deemed us worthy to travel the extra ten or so minutes. We continue to work hard at strategies to add value to those who travel further than necessary to us by choice. At around this time the historic “Purnell Motors’ trading name became simplified to Purnell”. The historic use of the term “Motors” to identify a car dealership had long ceased (but the history remains today in our company name). Purnell Blakehurst continues to follow the belief that prestige and luxury european motor vehicles should be sold as a customer focused personal service. The team at Purnell remember our customers and offer service beyond merely the sale of a car, and offer a personalized service throughout the whole ownership lifecycle. As referral and repeat business is the lifeblood of luxury vehicle business, customers remain assured of our best efforts. Purnell continues to invest in technology and training to ensure we maintain customer satisfaction at the highest levels, and to stay true to our business plan to offer a specialist, expert personalized service. An industry advertising expert was kind enough to gift our new tag line. After knowing Purnell for decades he helped us to summarize our business philosophy at the time of opening at Blakehurst when he coined our new tag line;
Rodney Dale |
 |
|||
 |
||||
 |
Purnell the early years: 1951 to 2009Purnell Motors was incorporated in 1951 by its founder Norm Purnell at its first location, the Princes Highway, Arncliffe. At this time a number of english motor vehicle manufacturers were represented in the new premises including Wolsley, Austin, Morris, Triumph. In the mid 1950’s Purnell Motors commissioned a Sydney architect of great reputation, Mr Neville Gruzman to design a benchmark facility for Purnell Motors at Arncliffe. The flamboyant design featured a four storey building with a service workshop in the basement, a quick lube facility and sales at street level, a floating mezzanine floor for administration and the roof slab was designed to take the load of an enormous neon “Purnell Motors” sign. The roof top was also used to house up to forty new cars. The Purnell rooftop sign was used as a landmark by train commuters on the Illawarra line until the later 1980’s when the sign was decommissioned. The striking building design saw it a local landmark and part of the taxi drivers visual landmark test for several decades. The concrete and glass showrooms were the fore runner of today’s modern vehicle showrooms and still stand test of time. Over the decades the English brands represented merged and morphed from numerous unrelated companies into British Motor Corporation (commonly known as BMC), Leyland then Leyland Australia, and then into JRA Limited. Whilst many of the original brands sold no longer trade Purnell Motors remained successful due to its personal relationship style approach in contrast to the growing impersonal motor industry. In the 1974 the business founder sold 50% if the business to the current ownership, the Dale family. In 60 years at the time of writing, Purnell Motors has only ever had two owners, a remarkable feat in the face of the demise of many historic English vehicle marquees and the countless dealerships that have come and gone. In the 1980’s the stable of marquees included Rover passenger cars (where Purnell was national dealer of the year on several occasions), Land Rover (starting when the iconic first Range Rover was imported in 1977) and Jaguar. In the 1990’s when Rover cars ceased to trade, Purnell Continued with Jaguar and Land Rover then added Saab to the lineup in 1992. In only ten months of trading in the first year Purnell was in the top 10 national performers. Saab eventually gave way to another Swedish brand, Volvo in 2003. |
|||
 |
||||
 |
||||
 |
|
|
|
|
Phone: 02 8558 7000
