Wardle and Keach was formed in 1926 by the amalgamation of two family firms, one of which had been first established in 1890 and the other slightly later. Albert Wardle came from the village of Kegworth to manage Liptons in Kettering. At the age of forty he went into partnership in 1900 with Mr Jacques who died a few years later. Messrs A Wardle and Son, founded in 1905, continued the coal haulage business, and Harold Wardle took over from his father and ran the business independently into the 1920s. Meanwhile George Keach from Melton Ernest in Bedfordshire had also migrated to Kettering to make his fortune in the same field. He too delivered coal from horse-drawn vehicles before progressing to general haulage in 1912 when he purchased some steam traction engines. In time the business passed to his son Charles who ran it as a sole trader concern into the 1920s.
The two companies worked side by side, more often in cooperation than in competition, until the young men decided in 1926 that they would benefit by amalgamating. The new partnership of Wardle and Keach operated from the Keach premises in Crown Street where they worked hard to expand the coal business and to develop a furniture enterprise up until the outbreak of war in 1939.
