Welcome to the home of Cussins and Light on the web. Here you can find out a little about the rich and varied history and development of the business and its people as well as learning about its current projects.
Today, Cussins & Light (1994) Ltd is a property leasing company with commercial properties in Malton, Selby and Goole and domestic properties in Berlin and Leipzig. It is currently run by Paul Cussins with help from father, Denys and sister, Liese.
Its origins date back to 1921 when two young men, Regge Cussins and Pat Light, who had met whilst serving in the RAF, began a working partnership which lasted for over fifty years.
Initially their sole aim was to avoid going on the dole by doing any work which came their way. Slowly they acquired enough cash to start selling motorbikes. A little while later they introduced “wireless” (mainly in component form rather than complete receivers) to their list of things for sale. Soon “wireless” took over completely and as time went by there was the further addition of electrical appliances as they became fully fledged electrical retailers.
The story of how they prospered is told in the “CandL Golden Book”, written by Denys, son of Regge, in 1971 to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the partnership. It is anticipated that this will be added to this site in due course.
In the sixties Regge and Pat handed the running of the business over to Denys (Regge’s son) and Ron Thompson (Pat’s son-in-law).
They continued retailing to the mid-eighties, at which time they were both approaching retirement age. For a whole variety of reasons they decided the best way to hand control over to the third generation, Paul (Denys’ son) and David (Ron’s son) was to convert CandL into a property company and then split it in two, one half going to Paul and the other half to David. This conversion was completed in the nineties and since then the two companies have gone their separate ways.
CandL’s philosophy has not changed since its humble start and was succinctly summed up in a few paragraphs written by Regge Cussins in 1934:
“Many times during the years we have been in business we have seen others start up, make a big show and apparently be doing wonderfully well; and sometimes, I must admit, we have felt a little envious. Well! We have just kept plodding along, each year carrying out some scheme that we thought would improve our position and at the same time enable us to give our customers better service. We are still at it; while some, at least, of the people we envied are to be envied no longer. Our policy is to build our business on really sound foundations, even if it does take a little longer, always striving towards better and better service.It is not an easy road, but we think you will agree that it is the best, and this is the road we still intend to follow! For we haven’t finished yet.”
To the right - a picture of the young Denys Cussins and Regge aloft a bonfire of Radio Boxes.
Currently this web site covers the period 1971 onwards plus a few aspects of CandL not included in the CandL Golden Book.
If you would like to contact Cussins and Light (1994) by email, click HERE
