Sam Alper, caravan maker, Times of London obit
Hyfler/Rosner
Patron of the arts, winemaker and caravan manufacturer with an
unrivalled gift for international publicity
(Times of London)
Sam Alper was 23 when in 1947 he built his first caravan. It
used the undercarriage from a Spitfire fighter and barrage balloon material
for the roof. Within 16 years Alper was heading the biggest caravan
manufacturer in Britain, making more than half of Britain's production
caravans.
Samuel Alper was born the son of a North London hairdresser.
Leaving school at 14, he studied electrical engineering at evening classes.
The Second World War saw him working on aircraft in the Fleet Air Arm, and
after demobilisation he joined his brother Henry's caravan company.
In postwar Britain materials were still in short supply. War
surplus aircraft parts, barrage balloon fabric and even bog oak dredged from
the Fens near the Newmarket factory provided raw materials for what were
then called Alperson caravans. Soon Sam had taken over the company,
determined to change several things. He was principally unhappy about two
aspects of Alperson - the name and the price of its product. At that time
the average caravan cost around £500, but the first Alperson sold for closer
to £600.
Alper set out to design a small, light and cheap caravan, which
he called the Sprite and which sold at a very competitive £199. In the first
year of production the new caravan sold more than 500.
Once he had established the Sprite as an inexpensive beginners'
caravan, Alper used his flair for publicity to promote the brand. In 1951 he
towed a Sprite on a 4,500-mile tour all around Europe, ending up in Florence
where he demonstrated the model in an international caravan rally.
The following year Alper hitched it up behind the elegant
3.5-litre SS Jaguar for a 33-day tour round the Mediterranean, broken only
by the necessity of leapfrogging Israel, owing to the security situation in
the region. The Sprite had to be hoisted on to the deck of a steamer to make
the journey from Egypt to Syria. In North Africa he received a mixed
welcome. On one occasion tribesmen attacked the caravan, but others, more
friendly, helped him to dig the car from the sand of the Sahara.
Alper never lost his touch for milking any situation for
publicity. In the 1960s he astounded visitors to the London Caravan Show
with a hovercraft Sprite caravan.
By the early part of the decade, he was the head of Britain's
largest caravan manufacturer. His company, Caravans International, brought
together three major brands - Sprite, Eccles and Bluebird - and manufactured
in seven European countries besides Britain, as well as the US, Canada,
South Africa and Rhodesia. At its peak Caravans International was building
more than 22,000 caravans a year, more than half Britain's entire
production. Alper's contribution to exports led in 1966 to his being
appointed OBE and to a Queen's Award for Exports. His work abroad led to him
setting up the European Caravan Federation, and he served as its president
for ten years.
Alper always had an eye for design. He was a fine sculptor and
it showed in some of his early models. But in the 1970s he turned to
professional designers to bring a new look to his caravans, among them Tom
Karen of the Ogle Design.
Caravan production was always volatile and its seasonal nature
made Alper look for alternative products. He built the first golf buggy in
Britain and presented it to President Eisenhower. He designed and built the
first of the Little Chef restaurants in Britain, basing his designs on the
roadside diners he had seen in America. He even produced prefabricated hotel
rooms. In 1982 a slump in the demand for British caravans finally forced
Alper's company into liquidation. He left the industry and took up making
wine at his vineyard just outside Cambridge. He set up the English Wine
Growers' Association and served as a board member of the English Vineyard
Association.
Another of Alper's interests was the arts. He loved opera, and
established a family charity to buy instruments for young musicians. He set
up Chilford Hall, the site of his vineyard, as a cultural centre. It was
there that in 1982 he co-founded the Chilford Hall Press, a fine-arts
printer which combined in 1989 with the Curwen Press to become Curwen
Chilford Prints, a print workshop which artists visit from around the world
to create limited edition prints. Also at Chilford Hall he established
Cambridge Curwen Print Study Centre, an educational charity to teach
print-making to young artists.
Alper also sent 300 caravans to Greece and Turkey for earthquake
relief, and established the Gibraltar Heritage Trust, and a sister
organisation, the Friends of Gibraltar Heritage Society, in Britain.
Alper was twice married, first, in 1956, to Isabel Grist, with
whom he had a son and daughter. This marriage was dissolved, and in 1984 he
married Fiona Morton, with whom he had a son.
Samuel Alper, OBE, caravan manufacturer, was born on April 25,
1924. He died on October 2, 2002, aged 78.
