Lives in Cricket No 19 - Frank Sugg

The Sugg Manufacturing Company Ltd made other products than cricket bats – the company proudly boasted that its footballs were used in the FA Cup Final for many years – all of which were branded Sugg Exelsa, cricket bats and equipment were the sports goods most associated with the Sugg name. As the company’s reputation grew, it sold willow to other bat manufacturers: the Stuart Surridge bat-making business was one of its best customers. However, faced by increasing competition from Far Eastern bat manufacturers in particular, Sugg Manufacturing folded in the late 1970s, and home-produced bats and other equipment were replaced mainly by imported products. Whether by agreement or not, HHB Sugg Ltd did not engage in advertising in the cricket periodicals in the years when Frank Sugg Ltd was still in active business. During the 1920s, however, the position had changed and the firm began to advertise in a range of cricket publications. Pre-war advertisements for HHB Sugg Ltd products frequently carried the slogan ‘The World Famous Sports Outfitter’, a phrase which served to lead most people to assume that the HHB Sugg business was a continuation of the earlier Frank Sugg business rather than a quite separate entity. Reflecting its wide product range, which after the Second World War included well-known brands of toys such as Hornby and Meccano, the firm advertised extensively in magazines and in the local newspapers. 114 Frank’s Business Career A 1922 advertisement of the HHB Sugg business that had split off from Frank Sugg Ltd in 1913.