Quintessentially British classic carmaker Morgan gears up for an electric world

You don’t have to be a petrolhead to care about the fate of the Morgan Motor Company, the quintessentially English car maker based in Malvern, Worcestershire since 1909.

Morgan, known for its sports cars that zip along country lanes, is to automobiles what John Lobb of St James’s is to shoes or Henry Poole is to bespoke suits – a hallmark of British excellence and craftsmanship for generations.

It is now four years since Morgan was bought by a private equity house InvestIndustrial, ending 110 years of ownership by the Morgan family. Milan-born Massimo Fumarola took charge of the business in April 2022.

The 54-year old, who speaks English with the amiable Italian accent of a Premiership football club manager, says his job is to help Morgan exploit its full potential and “bring this company to the next level”.

Fumarola has spent 30 years in the automotive industry working for brands ranging from Ferrari to Audi and was head of project management at Lamborghini immediately prior to coming to Malvern.

On the face of it the two companies could not be more different: Lamborghini makes flashy supercars beloved by crypto traders and celebrities, while Morgan’s traditional designs typically appeal to Boomers looking to enjoy their hard-earned money. Lamborghini has sales of more than £2bn a year, while Fumarola readily admits Morgan is one of the smallest automakers in the world.

Yet Fumarola claims to have a lifetime love of Morgan’s vehicles that made the job hard to resist.

His childhood neighbour had a Morgan and would regale him with stories about the vehicle and company behind it. The brand is something “I’ve been admiring the most since I was a boy,” he says. “I think a car says a lot about the culture of the people behind a car.”

The softly spoken executive has taken charge at a pivotal time for the industry, which must quickly transition to electric.

Fumarola believes he has the blueprint to take Morgan global and prepare the 114-year-old business for a net zero future.

“We need to expand the customer base, we need to go international, we need to design new cars. These are the three things that I am here to do,” he says.

His first challenge is to make Morgan younger.

“We need to reposition the brand because our traditional customer base is ageing and we need to bring in a new audience of customers,” he says, adding: “Younger doesn’t mean 25 years old, it means 40, 50.”

Under his watch, the company is investing in digital marketing and running more events, beyond those already in place at the network of Morgan clubs around the world. The business is also partnering with brands such as the upscale fashion label Orlebar Brown and the luggage maker Malle London.

Fumarola has spent no small part of the past year reorganising Morgan’s international distribution network, another key priority. 

Morgan recently opened its second dealership in Italy, in Bari. It has announced three new dealerships in Germany, including one in Berlin, and another three in France.

The company is also on the cusp of receiving authorisation from US regulators to export its new three-wheeled Super 3 model to America. Several dozen are packed and waiting to go at Morgan’s factory.

“We really have a lot of expectations from the US,” Fumarola says, pointing to strong online interest in the new three-wheeler.

“It’s promising,” he says, before adding: “It’s difficult, of course – it’s the most sophisticated market in the world, so you need to do the right things.”

Morgan is getting a lot of interest in South America too, Fumarola claims, as well as in southern Europe.

“Maybe one day we should have [a dealership] in Rome,” he suggests.

The Italian hopes to have the Super 3 model on sale in the Middle East by the end of the year, having begun the regulatory process last year. A partner with a network of dealers in Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Bahrain is ready to start selling Morgan three-wheelers once permission is granted.

“It is one of the smallest car makers in the world but we are pretty global,” Fumarola says.

Of course, Fumarola is also focused on the cars themselves. He plans to update each model and diversify them to appeal to different customers.

“We stay with three models, but we polarise the three,” he explains.

Improvements are planned for the Super 3, which was only introduced in February last year, as well as to the marque’s flagship Plus Six model, delivering “more comfort, more ergonomics and more GT [Grand Tourer] capabilities”.

He also wants to make its mid-range, 50-year-old Plus Four model more heritage-focused.

“After 114 years of history you have to respect the past, because the past is the asset,” he says. “The past and the people are the assets of the company.”

Updating Morgan’s models should help convince drivers to buy new, rather than second hand.

“When people ask me who is your competitor: it’s Morgan,” Fumarola says. “Our competitor is a used Morgan. We are competing with ourselves.’

Then there is the bigger task of launching the brand’s first all-electric car. The marque must have this in place by 2030 when Britain, along with places including California, the Netherlands and Greece, will ban the sale of new internal combustion engine cars.

The company is currently wrestling with the dilemma of whether to make an electric version of the new Super 3 or the Plus Six. Alternatively, it could introduce an entirely new all-electric model, and migrate the others later. Discussions are ongoing.

The biggest challenge is “how to turn a full electric car into something that is even more Morgan than it has been in the past,” Fumarola says.

If the company gets it right, Morgan can keep its traditional customer base onside while also appealing to a wider market.

Morgan has doubled the size of its research and development team and total headcount has risen from around 200 to 250 since the takeover in 2019. 

In the short term, Fumarola says there is “room to make these cars lighter, more fun to drive, more handmade, more analogue, more unconventional, at the same time make them more comfortable, more usable, more versatile – you can work in both directions and this what we want to do the next three years”.

If Fumarola is to realise his ambition of making Morgan a truly global brand, then the company must scale up production.

Over the past five years it has manufactured only around 600 cars a year on average. 

“I think the target should be 1,000 considering the US, the Middle East, the south of Europe,”  says. ‘I think the volume increase will come from international markets.”

Increasing production was the advice given to Morgan by businessman Sir John Harvey-Jones in the 1990s when he visited the then-struggling company as part of his BBC series Troubleshooter.

Then, management ignored the advice but credited the TV appearance with delivering a sales boost after showcasing its traditional manufacturing methods.

Fumarola enjoys re-watching the Troubleshooter documentary on YouTube, offering a window into the company’s roots.

“I am convinced that there is an opportunity to continue producing these kinds of cars,” he says “Morgan is about cars. Most car makers, they are shifting their business model to mobility providers, into digital companies. Politely, we are Morgan, we produce cars. That’s it.”