Nigel Mansell, F1 champion turned secondhand car dealer

Nigel Mansell and his son Leo will use the personal touch at their new car dealership and museum.

Nigel Mansell was Formula One World Champion in 1992 Photo: HEATHCLIFF O'MALLEY

What does a retired grand prix star do to fill his days on leaving the world of motorsport? For Jody Scheckter it’s all about organic buffalo farming, Carlos Reutemann prefers the world of Argentine politics and Sir Stirling Moss narrated a toddlers’ telly show. By comparison, Nigel Mansell’s latest venture seems a little mundane: 20 years after winning the Formula One world championship he is opening a used-car dealership in Jersey.

Any islanders with upwards of £4,000 in their pocket can head to the historic Art Deco building in St Helier that is being renovated and from January will be home to the Mansell Collection. There, either Leo Mansell or, if they are lucky, his father, will help source their dream car, while they browse “Our Nige’s” trophies and race-winning cars in a new museum. For motorsport fans it sounds like a dream come true, but surely Nigel could find a more exhilarating pastime?

“People come and go on this planet and very few people leave legacies behind; I’m hoping this unique building and what Leo is achieving will leave a great legacy,” says Nigel. “In truth we’ve been looking for a home for the memorabilia for probably 20-plus years. The biggest exciting thing is the opportunity to bring all of our future [business] interests and current interests together so that the power base comes from here. So although we’ll be trading downstairs and have the museum upstairs, there will be many other strings to the bow which people won’t see.”

Selling cars is not a new venture for Mansell. In addition to having been a special constable, charity director and grand prix superstar, he owned a Ferrari dealership and several franchises of Westover Motors on the South Coast. Surely a more obvious choice would have been to go back to flogging supercars?

“We want to throw our net and have the opportunity of anyone in Jersey coming and seeing if we can be of any assistance,” he explains. “Whatever the budget the customer has, that’s an important budget to them, and to us. We are going to develop a more personal way of doing business. We are not looking at quantity, we are looking at quality and that makes a big difference in how you trade. With the experience we have and with the enthusiasm that the Mansell team have, and our history in motorsport and the car industry, we are looking at doing things a little bit differently.”



Offering a personal service is key to the venture; as Leo (pictured above) explains, Jersey’s small population means customer satisfaction is all-important, as word will quickly get around. In fact, the business has already begun sourcing cars for people who spotted the website and got in touch, and there will also be a hand-picked selection for sale in the showroom.

The thing that makes this dealership unique is that, while downstairs you may cast your eye over a second-hand Mini, upstairs you can see the Williams FW14B with which Nigel won the world championship in 1992. There are four race-winning cars from across his career as well as the trophies which, unusually, his contracts stipulated he would keep.



“There are all the trophies throughout my karting career, trophies in F3, F2, IndyCar, GP Masters – the cross-section of interest in there is extraordinary,” says Nigel. “Everyone can have an opinion but as the stats stand at this time, the collection is second-to-none in the world. There’s much more memorabilia in there to do with motorsport which will create great interest for people who visit and will be an incredible tourist attraction.”

Unfortunately there is one evocative car missing from the collection: the Newman/Haas Lola with which Nigel won the 1993 CART IndyCar World Series at his first attempt the year after leaving Formula One, making him the only driver simultaneously to hold world titles on both sides of the Atlantic. Mansell unfortunately didn’t get to keep the car. “I even won a tractor, a nice big tractor, and I never got to see that either,” he says.



Leo, aged 27, briefly followed his father into the world of motorsport but is now focused on the business. He has already spent a year of hard work building the dealership and overseeing renovations to the building, which has always had a motoring use, from showroom to mechanic’s garage and taxi-firm headquarters.

“It’s a great environment to come and buy a car,” says Leo, who will run the business alongside general manager Steve Ainsworth. “To have the collection upstairs is the cherry on the top which gives us the opportunity to be a unique place and to hopefully sell a product which people will be very happy with.”



And will his father, who can still be found in the Formula One paddock as drivers’ steward at selected races, be stepping on to the shop floor to clinch a sale or two? “He’ll be overseeing everything and I’m sure if he’s in Jersey he’ll be on site, if not every day, then every other day. He has a very hands-on approach so there is the potential that, yes, someone could have Nigel Mansell sell them a car.”