A short history By Ian O’Reilly
The name of Perry’s comes from the founder Keith Perry who worked for a Greek shipping line called Epirotiki Lines. Keith was born in Bedford and worked in the Epirotiki office in Central London.
Keith always had an interest in vintage films and equipment, he quickly saw a gap in the rapidly growing home movie market. With his then partner Ian Sillet, they brought an apartment in Putney South West London importing films from America. They quickly arrived at the stage where they outgrew the apartment due to limited storage space.
As the business expanded, the next move was to buy a shop in Wimbledon, which everybody came to know as 129 Kingston Road SW19, it became the first Perry’s retail outlet. This was the head office, only a small shop but crammed to the ceiling in films and projectors, in fact the accountant could not believe that the premises could have such I high turnover. With the package movie now expanding Keith decided to open other branch in Twickenham and St Albans. His theory was, if he got big enough maybe Dixons would buy him up and he could retire a rich man (sadly this did not happen).
All went well for many years then Ian Sillett decided to leave the company and buy a Hotel in Stratford upon Avon (Sadly he was to die a few years later from cancer) which left Keith doing the mail order and running the retail on his own.
I had had a long working relationship with Keith, with me owning the film laboratory (Cine Reproductions) that produced most of his 8mm prints whilst the bulk of our production reduction printing was for sales promotion on 8mm, remember there was no Video in those days. Over one of our meetings, Keith informed me that he was losing interest in the business and wanted to retire to Spain and enjoy the climate of Majorca, he wondered if would I be interested in taking over the business with the option of buying him out.
I had a chat with my business partner Arthur Roberts to which he agreed we should go for it. Having no experience in retail it was a sharp learning curve, if you priced it to high, it would not sell, priced to low and you could sell it ten times over, however I quickly got the hang of it. Keith explained the rule of thumb by marking up the code on the item the last two / three digit numbers was the Nett cost so you could work out your profit margin.
With Keith now retired to Spain, I was left running 129 Kingston Road and then disaster struck. One Saturday the occupier in the above flat went away for the weekend leaving his washing machine on sadly, the door of the machine popped open leaving mains pressure to pump water flooding his flat and my shop below. I had a call from the fire brigade at 2oclock in the morning asking me to attend and bring my wellies !!
Owing to the water damage it was decided that we should close 129 Kingston Road and move the business to Isleworth where the laboratory was situated. Since we had spare accommodation it fitted in well. We had the front shop fitted out to accommodate the retail outlet and saved me splitting my working days travelling between Isleworth and Wimbledon.
Now business really took off, we were running three companies Perry’s Movies, Cine Reproductions, and West London Cine Labs the later serving Thames Television, and the likes of the BBC. The great thing about having Perry’s on-site laboratory was that if a customer came in wanted a film that was not in stock providing the processer was on temp, we could print and process while he waited, provided he had an hour or two to spare. I think this was quite unique as the only super 8 retailer that could offer this service.
Then in the mid eighties our premises was put up for sale looking like it would be sold to property developers. I had a very worrying Easter wondering where I could raise £250,000 to buy 581 London Road. At the eleventh hour our Saviour Larry Pearce (LGP Cine) brought 581, being cash rich from selling a property in Wembley. The deal was he would offer us a five year lease at Isleworth with the option of moving to his new premises at Rayners Lane in Harrow when the five years expired.
After five years this is what we did which was no mean feat, as we had to move machinery that had been in situ for many years, we called in Pickfords removals for an estimate, they declined owing to the fact that if they damaged the equipment in the move they could not be held liable. So I hired a 7.5 ton truck with tail lift and Arthur and my-self done it together that was some undertaking. When I look back now I wonder just how we done it.
Sharing a premises with LGP Cine was great fun and I really looked forward to going to work with Larry never a dull moment a true gentleman.
I could write a book of my time in the film industry and retail. I’m sure it would make an amusing Read.
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