After a long battle with ill-health, Wendy Mayo died at home on 18 December. She was 80 years old. Wendy, the wife of BDN publisher Colin Mayo, will be remembered with affection by many dealers and exhibitors as a friendly welcoming face at Motorcycle Trade Expo, where she managed the show’s busy reception desk for more than 20 years.
Wendy commenced her career at London magazine publishers Iliffe and Sons. Later acquired by the Mirror Group, Iliffe published more than 80 consumer and specialist magazines, including market-leading The Motor Cycle (The Blue’un, as it was widely known.)
She worked in the trade magazine subscription department managing numerous trade titles, including Motor Cycle and Cycle Trader, where Colin was assistant editor.
They married in 1962, and when Colin left Iliffe to work for the National Association of Cycle and Motorcycle Traders to launch Two Wheeler Dealer (TWD), Wendy played a key part in building a national database of cycle and motorcycle businesses. Replacing the association’s member-only magazine, TWD was mailed free to more than 6200 dealers.
When TWD was acquired by EMAP (now Bauer) to run alongside then fledgling weekly tabloid Motor Cycle News, Colin joined EMAP, and Wendy re-trained as a district nurse. Later, as the overlap between retailing bicycles and motorcycles came to an end, TWD was re-titled Motor Cycle Dealer and eventually sold.
When Larry Riches (Lintek) and Colin launched Motorcycle Trade Expo in 1996, Wendy ran the trade-only reception desks at venues in London, Donington Park, Birmingham’s NEC and the NAC at Stoneleigh Park.
A prodigious memory for dealers’ names and her database skills were challenged yet again when Roger Willis and Colin acquired British Dealer News in early 2001.
Rigorous Audit Bureau of Circulation checks on BDN’s circulation and Expo’s attendance figures meant both databases had to be accurate to the nth degree, and thanks to Wendy’s meticulous administration there was never a problem with ABC’s annual audits. It was no easy task. In those days, the majority of the show ticket applications and magazine subscriptions arrived by post or fax. In the weeks leading up to the show doors opening, Wendy would receive thousands of applications from dealers all over the UK and beyond. All the business names had to be organised to tie-in with staff names, job titles and their main business activity and then processed, printed and mailed. Wendy also led the show’s Click and Collect service, where businesses that had left it late (there were many) could collect their tickets on arrival at the show.
Despite failing health in her later years, Wendy never missed an Expo show, where she managed the reception desk and where many dealers and exhibitors will remember her for her welcoming smile and good humour.