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Martins Bank’s second drive in branch is opened because a director of the Bank, who lives locally, is acutely embarrassed that his wife has to cash her Martins cheques at the counter of rivals Barclays!  The former police station on Ashley Road is chosen, and so begins another bold foray into the kind of outlet we take for granted these days – albeit for the purchase of fast food – the drive-in.

In Service: 29 September 1966 until 1981

 

1966 Epsom Drive In MBM-Wi66P18.jpg

Image © Martins Bank Archive Collections

Incidentally, the article below can also be read on our MARTINS DRIVE-IN BANK page.  Special thanks to Ken Marsh, one of the original members of the Epsom Staff, for the lovely image below, of the Zephyr car at the drive-in counter.

 

1966 03 MBM.jpgthe bank's second drive-in branch opened at Epsom on September 29.  It stands well back in Ashley Road at the junction with Ashley Avenue, with a registry office on the opposite corner and a church and the Magistrate's Court across the way. This rather unusual combination is partly explained by the fact that the new branch stands on the site of the old police station. Even if some difficulty was experienced in obtaining sanction for change of use, despite the obvious 'lock-up', 'security' and 'custody' associations of the respective undertakings, the outcome has fully justified the trouble. The frontage has been laid out with stone paving, cobbles and beds for evergreen and flowering shrubs and once our customers adapt them­selves to the in and out of the drive-in this will prove a highly popular innovation in the district. Epsom lies in what is sometimes termed the stock­broker belt—well outside the bingo belt but close to the gin and Jaguar belt, so to speak.

 

Epsom Drive in 1966There are the Downs, the Racecourse and sufficient green belt to have kept the area mercifully insulated from becoming a suburb, and the number of estate agents' offices in this small township are an indication of the demand—and the price—for residential property. The shopkeepers are courteous, the train services to London frequent, and Epsom is altogether a good place to live in if one has-the means. The branch interior is spacious, with a rosewood counter fronted by white marble brickettes and dark glazed screens behind the counter space. Blue-green vinyl fabric covers two walls and, if the overall effect is somewhat clinical, the materials and finish throughout are worthy of what may justifiably be termed a prestige branch. Here the selection of the staff has been as imaginatively and successfully handled by London District as the Midland District handled the staffing of Peterborough branch which opened on the same day.

 

1966 Epsom Staff MBM-Wi66P19.jpgMr Brian du Feu, will soon have completed his third house move in four years—an indication of what progress in banking can sometimes involve. He was in the photographic business before joining the Bank and was for some years secretary of the Jersey Camera Club: his interests include hockey, tennis, badminton, surfing and skin-diving.  Mr Ian Fletcher joined the staff after six years at Chislehurst and Mr Kenneth Marsh, who has appeared frequently in magazine photographs of cricket, hockey or rugby teams, lives conveniently in Epsom as if by arrangement. Mr C. J. Butcher commutes cheerfully each day to Oxted with the help of his Renault-Banger and Miss G. C. Leggett, who joined the branch shortly before it opened, will tell any girl with ideas about the glamour of working in the Big City that a secretary's job in a London fashion house with travel costs of £2 a week for two years is a poor substitute for working at Epsom branch and living at home on Epsom Downs.   Quite naturally she wanted to try the London job and quite sensibly she packed it in: quite understandably Mr du Feu and his staff are very glad that she did. Epsom branch is off to a good start, and the business is likely to continue expansion on private and com­mercial lines. Our only regret about going there is that we cannot state how many accounts they have opened already, because one never knows who might read these words. But we now have a lot more sympathy for the sad-faced, milling crowds we passed on Hungerford Bridge and in Waterloo station on our way out that morning. They looked as if they had seen Epsom branch and were sorry they couldn't work there.

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1966 Epsom Interior MBM-Wi66P18

Drive In Counter 1966 MBM-Wi66P19

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1966 Mr BR du Feu Manager MBM-Wi66P05

1966 Miss G C Leggett MBM-Wi66P19

1966 Mr I Fletcher MBM-Wi66P19

1966 Mr K P Marsh MBM-Wi66P19

 

 

 

 

 

Mr Brian du Feu

Manager

1966 onwards

Miss C G Leggett

Joined the Bank Here

1966

Mr Ian Fletcher

On the Staff

1966

Mr Ken Marsh

On the Staff

1966

 

 

 

 

Title:

Type:

Address:

Index Number and District:

Hours:

 

Telephone:

Services:

Manager:

11-74-30 Epsom

Full Branch with Drive-in facilties

Ashley Road Epsom Surrey

491 London

Mon to Fri 1000-1500

Saturday 0900-1130

Epsom 24678/9

Night Safe and Drive in Counter

Mr Brian du Feu

 

 

Elterwater

29 September 1966

15 December 1969

1979

1981

opened by Martins Bank Limited

Barclays Bank Limited 20-29-89 Epsom Ashley Road

Drive-In Bank Closed

Branch Closed

Ernesettle

 

M