In the beginning………

1969! What a year. Jaguar’s fabulous XJ6 had been out for barely 12 months and the E-type still had only six cylinders. Nostalgia had yet to become fashionable. The sixties were coming to a close and the motoring world was looking forward. What use were old cars except to a few eccentrics? Weren’t they just clutter, dated and without style?

Perhaps, but Coventry Auto Components’ founder Trevor Scott-Worthington has been climbing in, out and under cars for over 45 years and has always been enthusiastic about older machinery. Cars are in the family blood; his father owned a garage in North London and it’s now run by his brother.

Trevor started work with Standard Triumph, with a five year engineering apprenticeship and ended up ‘apprentice of the year’ in 1962. As a hobby he rebuilt what we now call classic cars and following up a Classic Jaguar Association advertisement in Motor Sport, he teamed up with some friends in the US to help locate spares for SS Jaguars. When this early enterprise finished, Trevor branched out into XK’s – which soon became a passion. But when the parts started to migrate into the house (the garage was full) and eventually under the bed, it was not surprising that Trevor received an ultimatum – close down or move the parts out!

So Trevor moved the spares to nearby farm buildings. It was about this time that some Jaguar dealers were deciding that old stock was not good.Trevor discovered one such dealer and together with the late (and sadly missed) David Barber, they bought the lot. Trevor said, “I told them anything from chassis number C’ to whatever number was mine. Anything before was David’s.”

In that hoard was almost everything imaginable and Trevor had a full scale business on his hands. The more spares he sold, the more he bought and so the mushrooming process continued. So in 1988, after 19 years of running the business himself, Trevor took on his first employed staff. But old factory stock diminished and re-manufacture became a priority. Working with specialist companies,Trevor commissioned replacements, though it was sometimes a problem to get exact copies. With modern technology the process is much better now. Then in 1991 ,with the farm buildings reaching overload, they moved to Portway Close.