Tudor Williams, the jewel in New Malden’s shopping crown, is 100 years old this year.
 

We celebrate its centenary with a look back at its humble beginnings, and how it achieved its present eminence, not only in New Malden, but also with its stores in Cobham, Dorking, Farnham and Guildford.

New Malden might never have become the lively retail centre it is now if young Tudor Williams and his wife, Nora, had not come there from London to visit friends in 1912.

While there, Mr Williams noticed Nicholas Pierce was selling his drab little corner drapery shop in the main street and, unprepossessing though the property was, felt instinctively he should buy it.

So he did, using a £200 legacy from an uncle to purchase the freehold of 43 Malden Road.

They opened for business in 1913, living in rooms upstairs, and gradually began making their unpromising new venture into a major shopping landmark.

What they lacked in capital, they made up for in skills.

For instance, Nora Williams’s qualifications as a milliner meant the shop could offer a first-rate millinery department at a time when everyone, of all classes, wore hats.

Meanwhile, Mr Williams training in household linens quickly gave the business a pre-eminence in that department that survives to this day.

Then came World War I, and Mrs Williams had to shoulder the business alone while Mr Williams served in the Royal Navy.

But on his return they set about extending their premises into what had been their back garden.

This quadrupled their selling space and gave them a good frontage to Cambridge Road.

Malden Road in 1913 (the part we now know as High Street was not renamed until circa 1970) consisted mainly of private houses and some small shops.

Furthermore there were three other drapers competing for custom, one only two doors away from the Williams, making their rise all the more remarkable.

Thanks to the couple’s commitment and the fact Mr Williams’s promotional skills were boldly ahead of their time, the 1930s brought further expansion, culminating just before World War II with the purchase of Joseph Ransome’s butcher’s shop next door door at no 45.

After that, Mr Williams felt justified in advertising his business as “the most up-to-date junior drapery store in Surrey”.

But, as we shall see in next week’s Comet, the story of this remarkable business had barely begun.

Tudor Williams owed his name to his Welsh origins.

His father was the congregational minister of a tiny village in Pembrokeshire, where money was so scant, and career possibilities so slight, that the young Tudor left for London, where drapery stores customarily provided their staff with living accommodation.

Thus Mr Williams, like his wife, was able to gain retailing experience in various stores before taking the business plunge on his own.

It was to prove fortunate for New Malden that he did.

Tudor Williams’s 1930s photos on this page, blurred though they are by time, are uniquely valuable in showing what shopping was like when there was no such thing as self-service.