This year Stapleton’s celebrates 80 years since Sydney Stapleton set up his business in a simple parade of shops at 195 High Street, Watford in 1937. An entrepreneur of terrific dynamism and foresight, he was among the few to spot and take advantage of the fast-growing market for tyres. A decade on, in the post WWII years, the company’s total weekly wage bill amounted to the princely sum of £20. It’s safe to say in this 80th anniversary year the wage bill’s grown considerably now Stapleton’s employs some 1,100 staff at eight regional sales offices and eleven distribution hubs nationwide. It’s also safe to suggest that Sydney Stapleton would be staggered by the scale of his old business, with a current stock capacity of 1.5 million tyres available at any given time.