On Oct. 23, 2015, JCB marked its 70th anniversary by giving employees around the world the day off.
The company also marked the special day by introducing a limited-edition backhoe loader. JCB will make 70 of the special machines, which feature the vintage look last seen 40 years ago on the JCB 3CIII.
On Oct. 23, 1945, the late Joseph Cyril Bamford CBE founded the company in a tiny garage in Uttoxeter, Staffordshire, England, making trailers from wartime scrap. Today, the company has 22 factories, 11 in the UK, with others in India, the United States of America, Brazil, and China, employing more than 12,000 people.
JCB Chairman Lord Bamford said that JCB and its employees should be very proud of what has been achieved over the past 70 years – but the company’s focus is very much on the future. He said, “70 years is a long time, but the past is the past and while we are proud of it, our engineers are really only interested in the future and the products of tomorrow. You cannot rest on your laurels in business; you have to be thinking of tomorrow, the changing world markets and the products our customers need. That is what makes me and all our people tick.”
Lord Bamford, who was born the same day his father founded JCB, added, “My first memory of JCB really was my father. He was an engineering genius, there was no doubt about that and he was always dreaming of things, and dreaming of better ways of doing things. The backhoe loader my father invented was a godsend and started a mini revolution in construction machinery. Today the backhoe is one of more than 300 products we produce and sell globally."
Since JCB manufactured its first backhoe in 1953, the company has produced more than 600,000 backhoes and now sells them in 120 countries. JCB has also been the world’s leading manufacturer of backhoes for 15 years in succession with a range that spans 40 models.
The company now manufactures several types of equipment for construction, agricultural, and industrial applications, including vertical-mast rough-terrain forklifts and telescopic-boom rough-terrain handlers.
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