The History of BMW Cars

Originally, BMW was a part of a company that was composed of three other car companies. These included Rapp Motorenwerke and Bayerische Flugzeugwerke in Bavaria and the Fahrzeugfabrik Eisenach in Thuringia. Rapp Motorenwerke was a company that produced aircraft engines and in 1916 it changed its name to Bayerische Motorenwerke after the directors fired the founder of the company. The BMW name was then born after the combination of the company with Bayerische Fluegzeugwerke, in which BMW worked with on many projects, particularly in making their motorcycle line better for the public.

BMW did not become an official auto maker until around 1929 when they acquired the Fahrzeugfabrik Eisdenach company. During this time the BMW company took over the small cars that were being produced and were able to put their technology to use through making these luxury six cylinder engines that the world loved since they were so luxurious. Before WWII, BMW was mainly involved in producing cars, motorcycles, and aircraft engines which combined all the companies talents into one.

When WWII hit, the company was sanctioned by the government to produce only aircraft engines, despite the wishes of the director of BMW. They still dabbled with motorcycle production, however, the production of automobiles was completely stopped. After the end of WWII, BMW stayed in business my making pans, pots, and bicycles. All of which are worth tons of money today since they were produced only for a short time. Once 1948 rolled around, they dived back into the market with making more motorcycles. There were pre-war motorcycle and cars being produced by the factory that was under Soviet reign during this time. While the other factory that belonged to BMW were experimenting with development of luxury cars. However, the luxury cars did not sell as well as they had hoped and because of this, the company considered selling part of BMW to Daimler-Benz. However, the company was able to hold off during this financial period that was trying, as well as several other periods throughout their history in which it looked like the company would perish.

It was in 2000 that the company really took a step back and redesigned the majority of cars that they were producing. By now, BMW knew that in order to succeed that the company had to be able to move with the time, which meant doing more designs that were not just classic and timeless, but those that looked forward as well. However, the designs were not accepted well at the time, but those same kind of designs that are coming out with autos now are reminiscent to those that BMW produced ten years ago, which is saying just how forward thinking BMW is.

BMW started off as a dream and slowly came to be a reality. However, they have had their pressures along the way that has led them to understand the diversities of the market and what it must take to thrive in the market no matter what state the economy is in to justify what they did in order to stay afloat after WWII. Today, the brand is considered to top of the line in luxury and is one of the leading brands in the US market in the diesel segment.