1927–1939
In 1927, the factory moved again, this time to Courbevoie. The company began to buy in sub-assemblies from Citroën, as part of a dependency relationship that would be extended in the 1930s. In the same year new 5V and 6CV models were introduced. These would remain in production for a decade.
1932, saw more new model introductions in the small/medium category. The cars were focused on the lower end of the market: they were both well finished and relatively affordable, and they met with some success. By 1935, the range also included slightly larger 10CV and 11CV models.
The switch to all-steel car bodies at the end of the 1920s transformed the economics of auto-production in western Europe. The heavy steel presses now needed to stamp out the body pressings were hugely expensive. Manufacturers not able to afford to buy presses could subcontract steel body production to specialists in volume car body production, notably Chausson, but prices charged by such companies were set to recover their own capital investment costs, and further issues arose from the high capital costs of the individual dies, different for each panel shape produced. At the higher end of the French auto-industry Hotchkiss, still cash rich thanks to their lucrative armaments business, simply purchased their own steel press in 1929. Other higher end automakers responded by moving ever further upmarket, providing cars, as before, in bare chassis form to be bodied by traditional "bespoke" coach-builders who still took a more artisanal approach to producing steel panels. At least through the 1930s, several French luxury auto-makers were able to survive as low volume producers, dependent for their revenue on a relatively small number of rich customers willing to afford handmade cars. In the small and medium car sectors, larger manufacturers such as Peugeot, Renault and Citroën configured their ranges to reduce the variety of models (and different body shapes) produced, and to introduce a level of commonality between the body panels for different models. The idea was to produce a sufficient volumes to permit the capital cost of the presses and dies to be amortized over so many units that the selling prices of the individual vehicles remained attractive to customers. The 1930s was a difficult decade for the French auto-industry, during which even Citroën was driven to bankruptcy, surviving only because they were rescued by their largest creditor. For manufacturers of small or mid-market cars, unable to sell steel bodied cars in the volumes needed to finance the capital cost of the presses and dies needed for stamping out the body panels, the squeeze was still more acute. Respected producers such as Unic and Berliet simply pulled out of passenger car production and reinvented themselves as producers of commercial vehicles.[5] La Licorne, known in the 1920s for producing an unusually wide range of small and mid-market cars, but with less than a 1% share of the French auto-market by the end of the 1920s, confronted the same acute crisis in a different way, entering into an alliance with Citroën.[6]
In Autumn 1936 the manufacturer rebodied their 8CV and 11CV models with a body-shell designed for the Citroën 11 Légère purchased from Citroën.[6] Six months later the Licorne 11CV and 14CV models appeared sharing the body of the Citroën 11 Normale.[6] Six months after that, at the October 1937 Motor Show, Licorne followed the logic of this strategy by launching a version of their Types 316 and 319 badged as the "Licorne Rivoli" sharing not merely the body shells but also the engines of the equivalent Citroën models.[6] There were still differences; the wheelbase on the Licorne car was 10mm shorter than that on the Citroën Traction. From the outside, the cooling slats cut into the sides of the bonnet/hood were of a more traditional design on the Licorne which also bore a traditional Licorne grille at the front.[6] More significantly, the Licorne retained a traditional rear-wheel drive configuration while the Citroën, famously, was a pioneer of front-wheel drive.[6] As far as published prices were concerned, The 9CV Licorne Type LSN-316 Rivoli was listed for 26,500 Francs while the saloon/sedan version of the 9CV Citroën 7C was priced at 23,800 Francs.[6]
The French auto-industry did not bounce back from the 1929 economic crash with the same vigour as that experienced in Germany and Britain, but in 1938, with approximately 224,000 passenger cars sold, the car market finally matched the level reached in 1928.[8] For the second tier automakers trying to compete for sales with the market leaders in the small and midsize automobile categories, the news was less encouraging: the 1,972 Licorne cars produced in 1928 had equated to 0.88% of the French auto-market, while the 688 Licorne cars produced in 1938 represented just 0.31% of the market total.[9]
