Bugatti

"Under the umbrella of the holding company, the brands Dywidag, Züblin, and Heilit+Woerner Bau GmbH are maintained alongside the group’s main brand, Strabag – the latter had come to Strabag with Walter Bau. However, the entire company network consists of more than 80 subsidiaries – from A like Abfall Behandlung Recycling GmbH to Z like Züblin Umwelttechnik GmbH. At first glance, this may seem confusing, but in the world of large corporations, it is entirely common for numerous brands to gather under the umbrella of a holding company. For example, the Dutch-British consumer goods corporation Unilever operates with 40 brands: from Axe, Becel, or Coral, via Lätta, Lipton, and Lux, to Thea, Timotei, and Unox. The largest European automotive group, Volkswagen, has ten other brands alongside its main brand VW, from Audi, Bentley, and Bugatti, through Scania, Seat, and Skoda, to Porsche."

"“But then my brother suddenly took to drawing.,J ‘saw at once, and confided in my dear mother that he was the true Bugatti and would soon be far better than I, in spite of my studies, even if he were not already. I told her, too, that two Bugattis in the same class might lead to confusion, and that under the circumstances I preferred to give up art."

"An example of this is his estimation of the comparative strain on engines caused by road and rail travel. At the time, it was thought that roads caused greater strain than the rail- way, with its smooth surface and easy gradients. Bugatti soon saw that the contrary was the case; that bends in roads brought a reduction in speed which eased the engine, whereas the unbroken high speed of a train imposed a constant strain. He was, of course, quite right, and instead of treating it as of small importance, he decided to overcome it by giving his railcars much greater power than had previously been cus- tomary. He thus showed the way to (mechanical) wisdom, and since then has been generally followed."

"Major Dorand, who was in charge of this Section, at Chalais-Meudon just outside Paris, greeted Bugatti cordially and explained the kind of aeroengine needed. Bugatti set to work at once, alone in his room at the Grand Hotel, to design all the parts of a new type of engine. His designs, which were completed without the help of a drawing office, had no need to be touched up when the engine was being made. Spe- cialists will realize the amount and the complexity of the"

"Of a creator’s personality. But probably none was as con- “cerned as Bugatti to perpetuate this situation. Faced with the attractions of large-scale series production and lower costs, he retained his independent outlook, his freedom to invent, and his urge for perfection down to the smallest de- tails. Production costs meant nothing to him, once he was set on an idea. He took little notice of trends among rival car manufacturers, and paid no more attention to the pre- sumed tastes of the public. It is all the more remarkable that the public followed his so often. Such was the case with the first type he produced at Molsheim."

"Five cars produced in a year . . . this, of course, is what strikes one most. The production rate soon increased con- siderably; yet even when Bugatti cars were famed the world over each one was still built, finished and tuned as though it were a unique model being made for a particular customer, and requiring the personal attention of its constructor. Such an attitude was by no means as rare at that time as it would be today; mass production was still unknown, and cars were hand-built for the most part, each an expression"

"Bugatti gladly accepted the offer; and from 1915 onwards, in the laboratory which he turned into a miniature factory, he worked hard on a number of mechanical constructions and inventions chiefly related to aircraft. In particular, he designed and built two aeroengines, one a straight-eight cylinder and the other a 16-cylinder double-bank. This period of his life was probably the most inventive of all, and marked a peak in his career."

"planning to produce a hundred cars a day. But Bugatti, true to his standards, took no interest in that aspect of things. As in the past, he was more concerned to create than to produce. And, for the moment, to create meant to pick up the threads of his research and his work where he had been forced to drop them five years previously, at the outbreak of war."

"“What a surprise it is (he wrote), when just outside the typical Alsatian village of Molsheim you come across a ham- let of long, low buildings with brassbound doors of polished oak and with cement paths between them, all so clean and tidy, not a loose stone or spot of dust about anywhere . . . A car factory, that? Surely not! and yet .. . “It was my first visit to the Bugatti factory. He had asked me to go on a Saturday afternoon—‘We'll be able to talk quietly then.’ “There were no workmen about, the place was desérted. And this added to the feeling of being suddenly confronted with something unusual and beyond classification. “Visiting this domain of the Sleeping Beauty was one sur- prise after another. I stopped at the door of the first ‘work- shop’ to look at the lock, the catch and the hinges, for all were made of brass and were spotless; nor was there a trace of fingermarks on the copper door-plate. ‘Locks made by Bu- gatti, the proprietor pointed out. And those words ‘made by Bugatti’ were to keep echoing in my ears. The explana- tion of the shining cleanliness of all the doors into the various workshops—I almost wrote ‘the various sanctuaries of mechanics’—was quite simple. During working hours, an employee did nothing else but keep the paths and the work- shop floors clean—and the door-plates, from which all oily marks left by mechanics were wiped away immediately they were made. Such marks were infrequent, however, for it was a general rule to wipe one’s hands before leaving the work- shop."