They say a picture is worth a thousand words. Nothing could be truer when it comes to the picturesque Peugeot. The Peugeot history dates back nearly 200 years, with a weaver named Jean-Pierre in an area called Montbéliard, which was then part of the Duchy of Wurtemberg.
The two sons of Jean-Pierre, Jean-Pierre II and Jean-Frederic, started the Peugot Brothers and Maillard-Salins company in tandem with Jacques Maillard-Salins (a member of a prominent watch making family). But the Jean and Jaques team did not begin their saga manufacturing cars. Instead the company originally specialized in laminated steel and other tools. Then, the time finally came to expand the company and those running this family-style business knew just what the company needed to be prosperous. They broke in to the automobile production industry and built their first car, which was powered by steam in 1889, and later built a car powered with petrol merely a year after their first automobile debuted. However not everything was peaches and cream for the Peugeot family, and in 1896 Armand Peugeot decided to depart from Les Fils de Peugeot after a feud among cousins. Peugeot gave birth to his own company called Societe Anonyme Automobiles Peugeot by assembling a brand new factory devoted entirely to the purpose of producing cars. In 1903, Peugeot introduces a series of motorcycles that remain a pristine staple under this auto company’s name.
Production of cars continued flourishing with the following cars: Type 57 to the Type 134, Lion models like the VA and VC/VC1, Type 127 Torpedo, and the hp (7.5 kW) Lion VD2. However, a dark cloud began to loom over the company’s success, and production ceased briefly in light of World War I. The postwar bred a time of financial instability as the company fell into a downward spiral of debt in 1926. With this, the two companies that had been so successfully merged in the past were legally obligated to become independent from one another, coercing the creation of two different companies as a result: Automobiles Peugeot and Cycles Peugeot.
Despite fiscal volatility, the sun began to shine once again on the Peugeot motor company. By the time the Second World War had commenced, things were looking up with the launch of the 203 and the 204. Following suit, the creation of Peugeot SA allowed for exceptional in-demand automobile production to truly thrive. The mid seventies can be remembered in Peugeot history as an era of fruitfulness, since the 1966 union with Renault in the late sixties brought the assembly of an engine later known as the V6 PRV. Joint ventures had by Peugeot included partnerships with Fiat in the early 1980s, Ford Motor Company in the late 1990s, Toyota in the early 2000s and BMW shortly after 2001.
Today, Peugeot has striking plans for global extension and is seeking funding from the government to possibly develop a diesel hybrid drivetrain.
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