JCB DIGS DEEP FOR FAMILY FIRM
SURPRISE GIFT FOR COMPANY OWNERS AFTER THEY BUY 150 DIGGERS IN 60 YEARS
A LOYAL family customer of global digger giant JCB has been presented with their own special present from the firm – after buying 150 of their machines over 60 years. Immingham-based Eric Carnaby & Son has been a JCB customer since 1959 and has been one of the company’s most loyal customers. So to say thanks, JCB presented the plant hire firm with a unique present – a fully restored 1964 vintage loader which the family firm had been storing in a shed.
The project was a closely guarded secret until George Bamford – grandson of JCB founder Joseph Cyril Bamford CBE – sprung the restoration surprise during a visit to the Carnabys in Immingham.
JCB took six months restoring the digger before handing it back to the to the company at JCB’s World HQ in Rocester, Staffordshire. Specialists from JCB spent hundreds of hours lovingly restoring it.
Eric Carnaby & Son director
Roland Carnaby Junior said: “My family and I are over the moon with the restoration.
“Our JCB 1 is precious to us and we’ve been meaning to restore it for some time, but you know how it is – a business to run, and all that!” George Bamford said: “It has been amazing to see an old machine brought back to life by the JCB team. It looks just as it would have done on the day it came off the production line in 1964.”
Founded by Eric Carnaby y in 1946, the plant hire and d road haulage firm is now run n by father-and-son team m Roland Carnaby Senior and d Roland Carnaby Junior. The e bought their first JCB in 1959.