The sparkling history of Cantrell & Cochrane

Cantrell & Cochrane was the largest manufacturer of soft drinks in the world.

T J Cantrell establishes the business
Thomas Joseph Cantrell (1827 – 1909) was born in Dublin. He qualified as a medical practitioner and became a principal assistant at Grattan & Co, a Belfast firm of chemists. Grattan & Co also manufactured soft drinks, and introduced the first carbonated “ginger ale”.

Cantrell established his own chemists business with James Dyas at 22 Castle Place, Belfast from 1852.

Dyas & Cantrell manufactured mineral waters, ginger ale, lemonade and soda water, as well as other products. The firm began to manufacture sarsaparilla from 1856.

James Dyas left the partnership in 1859 to establish his own soft drinks and chemists business. Dyas & Cantrell continued to trade as T J Cantrell.

Perhaps no longer restrained by Dyas, Cantrell began to advertise extensively from the 1860s. The firm had depots in Dublin, Liverpool and Glasgow by 1862. The firm retained its headquarters at Castle Place, but expanding production saw soft drink manufacture relocate to 10 Arthur Place, Belfast.

Increasing demand for their products saw T J Cantrell relocate to 25 Bank Street, Belfast, a former brewery, in 1863. The firm commenced export of its ginger ale to America from 1866.

Cantrell & Cochrane is established
T J Cantrell merged with the soft drinks business of Henry Cochrane (1836 – 1904) of Dublin to form Cantrell & Cochrane in 1868. At this time the premises of the Hibernian Mineral Water Company of Nassau Place, Dublin were acquired.

From this juncture Cantrell became a sleeping partner at Cantrell & Cochrane.

Cantrell & Cochrane held contracts to supply several shipping lines, including Cunard, Inman, Montreal, National and City of Dublin by 1868.

Henry Cochrane continued to manage the Dublin site, and William Adolphus Ross (1817 – 1900) was appointed as manager of the Belfast factory from 1870. Under Ross’s leadership, the Belfast site was to prove far more profitable than the Dublin venture.

From around this time the firm began to add a chemical preservative to their ginger ale, which allowed it to maintain its quality in warm climates.

Cantrell & Cochrane was numbered among the “Big Five” producers of soft drinks in Belfast by 1871.

Across both sites, Cantrell & Cochrane produced 432,000 bottles of soft drinks in a single week in 1876.

Cantrell & Cochrane was the largest soft drinks producer in Belfast by 1876. The Belfast factory employed hundreds of workers. The artesian well supplied 17,280 gallons of spring water a day. The bottle filling machine, which had been designed by W A Ross himself, could fill 48 bottles a minute.

Cantrell & Cochrane successfully trademarked the “Club Soda” name in Britain and Ireland in 1877.

Ross was fired by Cochrane in 1879. Ross was to later win a court hearing for unfair dismissal, and establish a rival soft drinks manufacturing business on his own account.

Cantrell retired from the partnership due to ill heath in 1883. Cochrane remained as the sole proprietor, although the Cantrell & Cochrane name was retained.

According to the Belfast Morning News, Cantrell & Cochrane was the largest soft drink manufacturer in the world by 1884.

The Dublin works employed around 500 people by 1885 and had an annual production capacity of nearly 30 million bottles a year. Almost all of Nassau Place was occupied. The city and suburban trade employed sixteen two-horse vans. The Belfast factory was of a similar size.

The Belfast Morning News claimed in 1885 that what Guinness was to porter, and Bass was to pale ale, Cantrell & Cochrane was to ginger ale, especially in America.

Cantrell & Cochrane became a private limited liability company in 1898. The company was awarded a Royal Warrant by the King of Great Britain in 1901. Cantrell & Cochrane was one of the largest Irish exporters.

Henry Cochrane died in 1904 with an estate valued at over £550,000. He was succeeded as chairman by his son, Ernest Cecil Cochrane (1873 – 1952).

Cantrell died in 1909 with an estate valued at £70,045.

The Dublin factory employed around 1,000 people by 1914.

The First World War threatened the firm’s large and valuable American trade, so a factory was established in New York.

Sale to E & J Burke
Cantrell & Cochrane was sold to E & J Burke, bottlers of Guinness in America, in 1925, and Ernest Cecil Cochrane stepped down as chairman, although he remained as a director.

Cantrell & Cochrane had a capital of £200,000 in 1930.

The end of Prohibition in the United States damaged the Cantrell & Cochrane export trade.

E & J Burke was acquired by Guinness in 1950.

The American subsidiary, with a factory at Englewood, New Jersey, had been sold to National Phoenix Industries by 1953. The business became the first company in the United States to sell canned soft drinks from 1953.

Cantrell & Cochrane opened a new factory on Castlereagh Road, Belfast in 1956. The company employed a total of 1,100 people across the United Kingdom.

Allied Domecq and recent history
Guinness merged Cantrell & Cochrane with the Irish soft drinks operations of Allied Breweries (later Allied Domecq) to form C&C in 1968.

Cantrell & Cochrane (Dublin) had close to 60 percent of the Irish soft drinks market by 1974. Drinks were produced at a modern factory at Ballyfermot, Dublin.

C&C employed 1,600 people in 1997.

Allied Domecq acquired the 49.6 percent stake of C&C it did not own from Guinness for £270 million in 1998.

Allied Domecq sold C&C to BC Partners for £580 million in 1999.

C&C Group became a public company from 2004. C&C sold its non-alcoholic drinks business to Britvic in 2007.

Former C&C drinks are still sold by Britvic in Ireland under the “Club” brand.

The former American subsidiary still operates from New Jersey, and its products include C&C Cola and C&C Ginger Ale.

16 thoughts on “The sparkling history of Cantrell & Cochrane”

    1. lol just found a wooden crate on my allotment c&c. Can tell & cochrane with 12/70 marked on it and Burscough written on it it also says property of C&C lol

  1. Wasn’t there a factory (or maybe a distribution warehouse) in Stockport (UK) up to the 1970’s?
    I have a memory of the logo painted on the end of the building. I suppose it could have been just an advertisement.

    1. Cantrell and Cochrane were the “pop men”…who drove a truck round the streets of Stckport and sold pop including dandelion and Burdoch and you got mony back for returning your empties…now there’s an old idea that could make a comeback!…if i rememebr correctly they had a competitor but forget their name

  2. Yes they had a factory in Stockport also one in South London and one in Sunbury on Thames that I know of as I worked in them all on the maintenance dept

    1. Hello, I also worked at the Sunbury on Thames depot.
      I have to say it was the best job I ever had. Thought I was rich too £17 per week!!! I had a boyfriend there called Terry lofthouse I would love to get in touch with him we had such fun on the annual coach outing to south sea. Just like the carry on films.

    2. Hi Reg,
      My dad also worked at Sunbury C&C, think he was Transport Manager. His name was Les Reason, sadly passed away in December 2016 though. I found some lemonade bottles in his tool cupboard. Which my brother is keeping as a memory of the fun times we all had on C&C family outings to shows such as Billy Liar, Barnum etc.
      I know coca cola bought the sunbury site , my dad also worked for them for a while until he was made redundant. I guess it’s not there anymore?

  3. My great grandmother said her name was Mary Cochrane and that she was born in 1863. She ran away at age 14 from an unknown place in Ireland and stowed away on a ship to America looking for her uncle Michael Cochrane who was a famous general in the civil war. She also said she was related to the family that owned Cantrell and Cochrane. I would love to know if she really was.

  4. Judy if you see this reply can you message me on rlddean (at) hotmail.com , that sounds a fascinating tale, i’d love to try and help you, i love in Belfast btw… David.

  5. My dad worked at the depot in Farwig Lane,Bromley,Kent as a salesman up until his death in 1957.
    I worked as a driver at the Sidcup,Kent depot from 1969 to 1972.
    A man by the name of George Durham worked with my dad and I believe he ended up very high up in management with the company.

  6. I am sure Cantrell & Cochrane was still on the go when I was a boy in Glasgow in the 40s and 50s – the name is so familiar!
    I have a crown cap bottle opener with “Cantrell’s” on one side and “Ginger Ale” on the other – no idea where it came from! I wonder if it is pre 1868?

    1. Crown caps we’re invented in 1892 and the type of bottle opener you describe RD702661 were produced from 1923. I have one with “C&C GINGER ALE” on one side and “CLUB SODA” on the other.

  7. Karen, my first round as a van boy at C&C’s was with Les Reason, not sur e where we went, but i remember the general manager Mr Harry Whitehall saying to Les “here Les take this young lad with you” to this Les replied “I get all the greenens” not a good start but by the end of the week he [Les] had changed his mind. This was February 1962

  8. my mum mary elston worked there in the late 70s on the bottle assembly line standing the bottles up if they fell over this was at the sunbury on thames depot

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