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What’s MG and when did it start making cars?
MG was started as a side hustle from Viscount William Morris’s car garage, with manager Cecil Kimber modifying Morris Oxfords and selling them on with the Morris Garages badge on the front. The viscount’s entire business (which also included Wolseley, Riley, Morris and various manufacturing outfits) was folded in with Austin to create the British Motor Corporation in 1952.
Another merger saw BMC become the British Leyland Motor Corporation in 1968, and the whole thing was partly nationalised in 1975 after it collapsed. British Leyland was renamed the Rover Group in 1986, then it was owned by British Aerospace for a while and eventually bought by BMW in 1994.
The Germans kept the good bits and sold off MG Rover to the Phoenix Consortium of ex-Rover executives for £10 in 2000. Bargain. Though of course it never made a profit and went under in 2005 after talks with Shanghai Automotive (SAIC) fell through. Another Chinese firm, Nanjing, bought up MG but was itself taken over by SAIC in 2007. None of its cars are made in the UK anymore, but MG is one of the fastest growing brands thanks to its low, low prices and recent EV offerings.
MG’s greatest hits
01 MG M-Type Midget
The launch of the M-Type in 1929 really did save MG.
