- Founded
- 1899 – 1930
- Country
- France
Gaston Barré opened a cycle workshop at Niort in 1894, experimented with motor tricycles and quadricycles from 1897 and presented his first automobile at Paris in December 1899. The supplier-assembled voiturette earned a gold medal at the 1900 Exposition Universelle. Barré developed locally rather than moving into the Paris or Lyon clusters, adding a driving school and one of France's early after-sales service operations. The company became G. Barré et Cie in 1908 and reached its prewar high point when Barré cars occupied the first three places in the roughly 4,000 km 1912 Tour de France Automobile. Wartime shell and military-vehicle work interrupted civilian production. A 1919 relaunch used SCAP and Ballot proprietary engines in BA and AB2 cars, followed by the B4, AS and CS range and late two-litre touring and sports forms. Gaston withdrew during the Barré et Lamberthon period in 1926; the business became SA des Automobiles Barré in 1927 under his son Maxime. Regional loyalty could not offset expensive low-volume construction, and production ended around 1930, with some sources carrying liquidation activity to 1933.
Text adapted from “Barré” on Wikipedia ↗ · CC BY-SA 4.0 ↗