A 25th anniversary is special, but the staff at Gloucester-based Forge Motorsport were so focused on staying safe and working during the pandemic they had forgotten that they had reached this milestone.
Forge MD Peter Miles, said: “Dan Merchant Watkins from our media team was working on some designs and popped into my office to say, Pete we are 25 years in business this year, I’ve just checked, we better get busy celebrating. Dan's reminder set us off on the timeline.
"Forge Engineering was a local sub-contact engineering machine shop, started by my Uncle and Aunt and Juri and Josie Zaslawski along with my parents Fred and Gwen Miles.
One of the machinists who simply had a passion for modifying his Ford Escort RS Turbo, wanted to make a blow off valve for his own car on the machines. So following some discussions and rough sketches, prototypes were made, testing carried out, and a small production run of 50 pieces made.
"We went off to the Autosport international show at the NEC Birmingham with a briefcase full of valves to show prospective buyers, five hours of walking the show and we had received orders for 300 valves and we were off and running.”
Over the next few years other products were added for Renault, Lancia, Fiat and Forge expanded into VW and Audi, receiving large orders from the USA, Europe, Hong Kong, and beyond.
Sales manager Alex Harry takes up the story: “Forge is successful due to the amazing, dedicated and talented staff that work here, these skills allow us to supply to the world. We are now a global supplier, selling to dealer networks throughout Europe, Asia, the Americas, Africa, the Middle East, New Zealand, and Australia. We have an office in the USA based in Florida, and one in Asia based in Taiwan, and the good news is we have just had our best year ever in 2020 as we worked hard to safely negotiate the Covid Global pandemic.
“We have managed to increase our staff numbers to 55 and the rest of 2021 looks good. Here’s to the next 25 years and the half century.”
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