Welcome to RetroMarques Ltd Website...

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RetroMarques offers a range of services to support you, the classic car owner - or potential owner!  As owner-enthusiasts ourselves, we hope to provide good advice on most aspects of classic car ownership.  Routine servicing, repairs and upgrades are carried out in our Strensham workshop where we serve a number of owners who entrust their pride and joy to our classic car servicing and classic car repairs services.  Also located at Strensham is our rebuild and restoration workshop and here we will have 2 or 3 cars undergoing a range of restoration tasks right up to a full nut-and-bolt rebuild to ‘as-new’ standard.

The restoration service goes hand-in-hand with our bodywork and paintshop services provided in our facility nearby in Malvern – Tony Williams Bodyshop.  With body and paintwork, mechanical and rebuild services all in-house and working closely with trusted specialists close-by, there is little that we cannot tackle in-house and pride ourselves in providing a one-stop shop for your classic car needs.

Secure storage is also available at Strensham should a lay-up be required and valuation, market advice and classic car sales are also catered for, with sales available both on a commission basis and outright purchase.
The team of specialist at RetroMarques want to offer the majority of services you may require for the ‘through life’ care of your pride and joy: an end-to-end classic car care solution and, importantly, a traditional, trusted service – at a fair price.

Customer Comment:“… just wanted to say that the MG feels like a new car. Much more responsive, picks up quicker, and generally feels tighter, so very many thanks to you and your team”. Mark S

About Us...

Established by Mark Knight and Rob Mears in 2009, RetroMarques has always been a company owned and operated by enthusiastic classic car owners.  Mark owns a small collection of classics which span the 50s, 70s and 80s.  We’ll gloss over the ‘every day classic driver’ 1984 Peugeot 205 to the Alfa Romeo Coupe, Mercedes-Benz 190E 2.5-16 ‘Cosworth’ and Austin Healey 100/4. Mark is an Austin Healey Club committee member and actively supports the other clubs too.  Staff members also own a range of classics, from pre-war Rover Sports to Buick saloon!

First and foremost, we are classic car enthusiasts and strong advocates and trade supporters of the FBHVC (link). RetroMarques was founded in the belief that we should provide a combination of friendly, high-quality service and yet also provide value for money. We believe you want traditional values and to establish a trusted relationship – both seemingly lost in many areas of business today. We want you to feel that your car is with people who both care and are capable. Our specialists have accrued many years of experience and expertise and with over 100 years of experience in the bodyshop, we feel we offer a good depth and breadth of expertise. Rest assured we would rather say ‘No’ to a request for work and put you in touch with someone we believe can better help, than offer a sub-optimal service.

RetroMarques offers a range of services: from advising on ownership and sourcing a classic car, to storage; maintenance; repairs and improvements; and vehicle purchasing and sales. You may choose to use each service separately or all of them, over time, as a ‘through life’ classic car care sequence of services. Our aim is to provide you with an end-to-end classic car care solution.

We believe in working with and supporting small, local specialists and trade suppliers and have a well-established network of people we work with. Chroming, carburettor rebuilding, gearbox and overdrive overhauls, blasting and powder-coating, instrument refurbishment, brake cylinder and servo rebuilding, trim and upholstery and machine-shop specialists are all on hand. Since February 2013 we have our own specialist body and paintwork facility – Tony Williams Bodyshop close by in Malvern, so this means that all aspects of bodywork repairs, paintwork – from a small scratch to a full bare-metal respray – and anti-corrosion protection, can all be carried out by us, often in concert with mechanical work in the workshop or of course where a full restoration may be required.

Finally, we aim to act as a source of good advice: call or email us no matter whether for tyres or touring! Mark runs an email distribution list which keeps local classic car owners up to date with charity and other classic car events. Just drop him an email and you’ll get the updates!

The RetroMarques Team

Mark during 2018 Nuvolari Rally

Sale Services...

RetroMarques is pleased to offer a classic car sales service. We both source cars for our own sales, so we are always interested in purchasing classic cars and also offer a brokerage service for clients where a car is sold on a sale or return or commission basis. We will offer our best advice on market values, options to increase the value of a car prior to sale and if a client chooses to proceed to sale, the preparation, photography and all advertising of the car. Cars have been sold not only across the UK but into Europe and further afield e.g. to Australia!

Customer Comment: ‘3 weeks of owning the Alfa Spider now (JFK)....Loving every minute of it,drives superb, thanks again for all your professional service and advice it was and continues to be a memorable journey'. Many thanks Sean

Cars for Sale...

Cars in Preparation for Sale...

Previously Sold...

Here is a selection of the cars we have sourced and sold, we are actively seeking similar cars to purchase outright or to sell on your behalf.

Customer Comment: 'RetroMarques offered a one-stop service for selling my classic car. They collected, tidied, serviced and sold the car within 3 weeks of picking it up. Highly recommended'. Tim, Chipping Norton.

Sourcing...

When considering the ownership of a classic car, maybe for the very first time, good advice is of great value. Many buyers worry about either 'buying with the heart and not the head', or the potential risk in buying a classic car without any specialist knowledge, either generally or in a particular model.

Whether at the early stage of considering that you might like to own a classic car or having already decided on a particular marque or model, we can offer you sound advice – advice based on our own ownership and extensive driving experience, touring many thousands of miles in our own cars over the years, but importantly also founded on an in-depth knowledge of prices and value trends.

Let's face it, spending a few hundreds of pounds up-front in sourcing and purchasing the right car is a lot more cost-effective than buying a car which turns out to need several thousands of pounds in rectification!

So, typically, this is how we would proceed:

Discuss aspects of ownership of particular models and marques, then, understanding your budget and preferences, begin to source the right car.

Refine the search to one or two cars that fit your requirements then carry out a comprehensive inspection and report to you.

If instructed, negotiate the purchase on your behalf and on completion, recover the car to the workshop where any work required (or desired) to be completed can then be carried out prior to collection or delivery to you.

Please contact us to discuss sourcing your ‘dream classic’ - we’ll offer you the best advice we can!

Customer Comment from David: ‘Just a short note to let you know that the Porsche arrived in Australia on Friday. Thanks again for all your help in this project’

Storage...

RetroMarques is able to offer short and long-term car storage, so no matter whether you are moving abroad to work, have lost your existing storage facility or just don’t have the garage space at home, we can help. We offer long and short-term secure storage of cars offering the flexibility of routine access to your car so that it can continue to be used should you wish to do so.
We are ideally placed:

• With easy access just off the M5 and M50 motorways, just a few minutes from the Cotswolds and the Malvern Hills!
• Mid-way between the Prescott and Shelsley Walsh hill climbs
• With a high degree of security: the 2 facilities are located within a gated, overnight-secured and manned site.
• Well-ventilated units which do not ‘sweat’ and which are ‘cool’ in summer and ‘warm’ in winter, thus offering near-ideal storage conditions.

Long and short-term secure storage of vehicles offering the flexibility of routine access to your car so that it can be used!

It goes without saying that with co-located maintenance and repair facilities, your classic car can be serviced or repaired whilst it is with us. As part of the storage service, we can offer:

• Continuous low-level care and maintenance
• Pre-use/pre-collection (or delivery) checks
• Servicing and valeting, including steam cleaning
• Storage accessories such as car covers, trickle chargers, tyre trainers (to stop the tyres developing flat spots) and other options.

Finally, administration can also be carried out

• SORN, taxation and annual MoTs; especially useful if you’re not resident in the UK.
• Import services, including collection from the port of arrival, roadworthiness checking and an initial MoT test, production dating letter sourcing and then registering with the DVLA for a V5C (registration document).  FIVA ID cards and HTP Passports can also be taken care of.

Restoration...

Since taking over the bodyshop in 2013, our mix of body, paint and mechanical skills make us ideally suited to offer restoration and rebuild services as we can effectively offer a ‘one-stop shop’ for a wide variety of restoration or rebuild jobs.

We have a dedicated ‘clean workshop’ where there will typically be 2 or 3 projects in work at various stages of a restoration and most likely another 2-3 elsewhere in the business, perhaps still going through the bodyshop or in storage awaiting commencement.

Every restoration or rebuild job is different and brings its own challenges!  Recent projects include the completion of 2x part-restored Healey 3000s, the first was a restoration that had been started some years ago and then deteriorated, so an assessment of condition was carried out first and in agreement with the owner we effectively started again.  The 2nd Big Healey was bought in for a customer seeking a late-model Healey 3000 and was a part-completed restoration.  With much of the mechanical work completed we fitted the panels, painted them, refitted them and then finish the interior and boot trim before shakedown running and handover to the customer; a very cost-effective way to buy into Healey 3000 ownership!

A long-term customer of ours has a period working abroad and so their WWII Jeep came to us for a full nut-and-bolt restoration.  Much discussion ensured as the body tub was in very poor condition but wishing to preserve some originality and patina, we rebuilt the original tub, jig-straightened the chassis and rebuilt her with all mechanicals fully stripped and rebuilt; the family should have her for many years to come!  More of a straightforward rebuild, an early boat-tail Alfa Romeo Spider was shipped in from Australia, already in paint and back on its wheels, for us to build back up to near-concours standard. 

Project managing the restoration and working closely with local and marque specialists we are able to offer a quality but cost-conscious service – no £250k rebuilds here!

Customer Comment: ‘Thank you and the team at Retromarques for all the work that you carried out on my Range Rover, and for all your hard work, skill of hand, attention to detail and care. I had a great drive back to Bristol yesterday and the car felt and looked great' – Chris

Alfa Romeo 1750 Spider on arrival Alfa Romeo 1750 Spider complete

Detailing...

RetroMarques is pleased to offer a detailing service in partnership with Neil at Cotswold Bespoke. Having been searching for a detailer who felt our care and passion for classic cars we had a chance meeting at Prescott Hillclimb and within a few days Neil was detailing his first classic at our workshop – an E-type Jaguar!

Neil offers a bespoke, top-quality detailing service and whilst fully mobile is also detailing in our purpose-built detailing booth. The majority of detailers do not tailor their services to the particular nuances of classic cars yet with Cotswold Bespoke you can assured of a service tailored to the paint, chrome and interiors typical of classic rather than modern cars.

We don’t doubt that you cherish your classic car (as do we!) and entrusting it to Neil to care for the paintwork is something we should all seriously consider, no different surely, to caring for the mechanical well-being of your car!

Services include: pre-wash, snow-foam wash, rinse and dry, tar and contamination removal, hand polishing, machine polishing, waxing and sealing including ceramic coating; leather deep-cleaning and feeding; engine bay cleaning; wheel cleaning and protection.

Location and Contact...

Business, Car Sales and General enquiries: Mark Knight on 07791 417256 or Mark@retromarques.co.uk
Workshop Repairs and Maintenance: Steve Norris Steve@retromarques.co.uk or Sue Bailey on 07791 417191 or Sue@retromarques.co.uk

Address: Unit 9, Strensham Business Park, Strensham, Worcs, WR8 9JZ - Click here to download a handy document you can use to find us.