Following on from meeting Taradasan in Geneva, things moved forward at a pace.
Nissan announced their UK plant would be built in the Northeast. Work started on construction in 1984 on a disused airfield outside Sunderland.
Nissan only wanted a handful of UK experienced motor personnel. Ian Gibson, MD, was recruited from Ford, John Cushnihan from Rover Cowley as Manufacturing Director, Andy Green (followed by Peter Hill) from Rover as Purchase Director. The Finance (or rather Cost) Director was the only senior Japanese on the senior team. Other than an odd senior buyer, e.g. Geoff Smith from Ford, that was it. The rest were non-UK motor industry.
All quietly spoken intelligent people intent upon building powerful partnerships. Uniquely, this team chose to work with single suppliers for each component system or commodity. This was not the case elsewhere in Nissan. So on the products we won, we were the supplier - Nissan's emphasis rather than mine. Nissan gave us the specification of what was required and the "envelope" into which it fitted. Included in the specification was our piece-part selling price. The latter was based upon a defined % of the final ex-factory gate cost. It was our responsibility to design, develop and produce to fully meet the specification. It was a full 'Open Book' costing. In the Open Book format was a line ‘Profit’ and it had better be in the black for Nissan. (Losses = going out of business = no use to Nissan.) Refreshing. Partnership. One team.
In June 1986 we began supplying Nissan Motor Manufacturing UK at their giant Sunderland plant, Tyne and Wear. Handbrake, rear suspension links, for the Bluebird. Later handbrake, pedal box, gearshift and rears suspension links for the Primera and Micra.
Nissan became a major, major customer, from whom we were to learn such a great deal.
One of the company’s greatest achievements was to supply 10,000 Primera rear suspension links per month to their giant Opama plant near Tokyo, Japan...unimaginable just a few short years before.
Above all, I had learned in the early 80s:
GOOD ENOUGH IS NOT GOOD ENOUGH… ANYMORE
It became my mantra and appeared on key Rearsby documentation.