Erskine (automobile)
Erskine was an American automobile brand which was founded in 1927 operated by the Studebaker Corporation of South Bend (Indiana) to 1930. The brand was Albert Russel Erskine (1871 - 1933) named, who was then chairman of the Studebaker Corporation.
History
During his presidency, Erskine held the Studebaker engineers to develop modern engines. This Studebaker won a number of car races and was able to win more market shares with the expensive automobiles. So Studebaker but could offer customers in the U.S. no more entry-level model and Erskine, who was always fascinated by the smaller European cars, saw a market potential in a compact car with a short wheelbase, especially if he could expand the market presence Studebakers in Europe.
The car was introduced in time for model year 1927, was named after its inventor and was sold as "The Little Aristocrat ". Thus, the Erskine was affordable, built a Studebaker six-cylinder engines and not the more modern Studebaker engines and put the sale price to 995, - U.S. $ fixed. The body design was by Ray Dietrich and the design proved to be quite spectacular and found much acclaim in the British and French press. Initially, the car sold pretty neat. But a year later, Ford introduced his Model A at a price of 525, - U.S. $, what the Erskine to 470, - undercutting U.S. $.
To remedy this, hit the marketing department of Studebaker ago, the Erskine to be made larger, and so extended to the wheelbase of 2743 mm to 2896 mm. Thus, the Erskine was no longer a compact car but was more like his Studebaker counterparts. Therefore, it came up on the Erskine brand in May 1930 again in the Studebaker brand. Less than a year later tried Studebaker the same again with a brand called Rockne.
Albert R. Erskine
Thus strengthened Albert Erskine ultimately Studebaker automobile core business and took care of the necessary technical progress, which helped the company probably about the first years of the Depression.
But Erskine procured the payment of dividends from Studebaker's capital stock to the shareholders, as worsened depression; this caused a price decline and weakened the company. Erskine had not only created the two unsuccessful brands Erskine and Rockne, but also the luxury car manufacturer Pierce -Arrow purchased during the golden 1920s, which you then had to sell to an investor group to improve cash flow.
Before he lost control of Studebaker, Albert R. Erskine committed suicide in 1933 at the test site of Studebaker outside South Bend.