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Food

Just desserts: a history of Pearce Duff

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Pearce Duff is the leading powdered blancmange brand in Britain.

Origins
Pearce Duff was established by William Pearce and William Henry Duff (1793 – 1874), a Hampshire-born cook, in 1847. Baking powder and egg substitute powder were produced from a private home.

Growing sales saw the business relocate to a factory at Long Lane, Borough, London by the mid-1860s. Newspaper advertising had commenced by 1866.

Control of the business had passed to George Pearce and Daniel Duff (1837 – 1917) by 1884.

Relocation to Rouel Road
Pearce Duff relocated to the former premises of Young & Co, a glue manufacturer of Rouel Road in Bermondsey, from 1890.

The factory was briefly closed in August 1911 due to worker intimidation by striking employees.

The Pearce Duff factory on Rouel Road/Spa Road, Bermondsey
The Pearce Duff factory on Rouel Road/Spa Road, Bermondsey

In 1914 the partners were Daniel Duff, Mrs Elizabeth Jane Duff (born 1870), Daniel Duff Jr (1879 – 1953), James Thomas Hosking (1856 – 1922) and Leslie George Cockhead (1861 – 1947). Nearly 500 people were employed at the five-storey Rouel Road factory.

J T Hosking retired from the partnership in 1916.

Daniel Duff died with an estate valued at £65,091 in 1917.

Pearce Duff had been registered as a private limited company by 1937. Daniel Duff Jr was appointed managing director.

L G Cockhead died with an estate valued at £90,327 in 1947. His nurse, with whom he was romantically involved, was granted an inheritance of £20,000.

Daniel Duff Jr died with an estate valued at £165,026 in 1953.

IMG_20160711_151938

Introduction of automation; acquisitions
Mechanisation and automation of the factory was completed in the mid-1950s. A fully-automated plant for manufacturing custard powder was installed in 1957. Products were exported to 77 countries.

The business remained family-owned, and four members of the Duff family sat on the board of directors. Nearly 30 percent of production was exported in 1962.

A factory was acquired at Annan, Dumfriesshire to manufacture jellies in 1965.

Hugh Bidwell (1934 -2013) was appointed managing director of Pearce & Duff in 1970, and became chairman from 1971.

Pearce Duff acquired Marela from W R Grace of New York in 1973. Marela manufactured pickles and Fardon’s sauces and vinegar. In return, W R Grace and Barings Bank took a 40 percent stake in Pearce Duff. The acquisition gave Pearce Duff an annual turnover of around £4.5 million.

The Bermondsey and Annan factories were closed with the loss of 300 jobs in 1974. Production was relocated to a new factory at Dunstable, near Luton, where 250 people were employed.

Sales worth over £3 million in the Middle East and West Africa led Pearce Duff to win a prestigious Queen’s Award for Export Achievement in 1979.

Pearce Duff sorbet mix, probably from the 1980s
Pearce Duff sorbet mix, probably from the 1980s

James Ashby & Sons, tea and coffee importers of London, was acquired in 1983. The purchase took Pearce Duff annual turnover to over £16 million.

Pearce Duff loses its independence
Hugh Bidwell and Sir Kenneth Cork (1913 – 1991) held a majority stake in Pearce Duff by 1984. That year they sold the business to Gill & Duffus, the largest cocoa trader in the world, for £4 million.

Dalgety acquired Gill & Duffus the following year. Dalgety merged Pearce Duff with its own Spillers Homepride division.

Pearce Duff products such as custard powder and baking powder were eventually discontinued in Britain, leaving only the blancmange powder to remain in production.

Dalgety sold its food ingredients business, including Pearce Duff, to Kerry Group of Ireland in 1998.

Pearce Duff blancmange powder is manufactured in Rotherham, Yorkshire. 700,000 units, to the retail value of £500,000, were sold in 2006.

Pearce Duff custard powder is sold in Pakistan and Spain, and Pearce Duff remains the leading brand of baking powder in West Africa and the Middle East.

Food

Baking point: George Borwick & Sons

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Borwick’s was the highest-selling baking powder in the world.

George Borwick establishes the business
George Borwick (1807 – 1889) was born in Cartmel, Lancashire. He worked as a teacher in West Bromwich and married Jane Hudson (1807 – 1868), the daughter of a Congregationalist minister, in 1831.

Borwick’s brother in law, Robert Spear Hudson (1812 – 1884), had introduced the first successful commercial soap powder in 1837. A trained chemist, Hudson gifted his formula for baking powder to Borwick.

Borwick relocated to 18 Aldermanbury, London, to work as a wholesale agent selling Hudson’s washing and bleaching powder as well as his new baking powder, from 1844.

“Borwick’s German Baking Powder” received a recommendation from the private baker to Queen Victoria in 1849.

The firm traded as Borwick & Priestley, wholesale druggists and drysalters of 24 and 25 London Wall, London, between 1850 and 1852.

Borwick also introduced a successful egg powder.

Dr Hassall (1817 – 1894) analysed Borwick’s baking powder in 1855 and found it to consist of tartaric acid, soda (or maybe potassium carbonate), ground rice, a small amount of wheat flour and possibly a little sugar.

Borwick’s sales averaged £12,000 to £14,000 a year between 1845 and 1857.

Borwick’s baking powder and egg powder became some of the first widely-known consumer products in Britain.

George Borwick employed 75 men and boys and 8 girls in 1861.

Growing sales saw premises relocated to 24 Chiswell Street, Finsbury from 1864.

George Borwick & Sons
Robert Hudson Borwick (1845 – 1936) and Joseph Cooksey Borwick (1847 – 1913), sons of George Borwick, entered the business in 1865 after a brief period working as manufacturing confectioners. They were made partners by 1870, and the firm traded as George Borwick & Sons.

George Borwick & Sons was awarded a Royal Warrant for supply of baking powder to the Queen of the Netherlands in 1870.

George Borwick had retired to Devon by 1881, and he died in 1889. The value of his personal estate was estimated at £259,740. The firm was left to Robert and Joseph, whilst his eldest son Alfred (born 1837) inherited his estate at Walthamstow.

600,000 packets of Borwick’s baking powder were sold every week by 1896.

Robert Borwick was knighted in 1902.

George Borwick & Sons was registered as a limited liability company with a capital of £100,000 in 1902.

Joseph Borwick died with property valued at £159,419 in 1913.

Robert Borwick had retired from active management of George Borwick & Sons by 1915. His eldest son, Robert Geoffrey Borwick (1887 – 1961), took over as chairman of the business.

Robert Borwick was created a baronet in 1916, and elevated to the peerage from 1922. He died in 1936 with an estate valued at £361,000.

George Borwick & Sons had its premises at 42-44 Croydon Road, London by 1949.

Takeover and subsequent history
George Borwick & Sons was sold to H J Green & Co of Brighton, a traditional family-managed manufacturer of sponge mixes, in 1955.

H J Green was acquired by Pillsbury of Minneapolis in 1964.

A new factory was established at Rotherham, Yorkshire, in 1979.

Pillsbury was taken over by Grand Metropolitan in 1989. H J Green was sold to Dalgety in 1990. Dalgety sold its food ingredients business, including H J Green, to Kerry Group of Ireland in 1998.

Borwick’s baking powder continues to be sold across Britain.

Food

Starch in their eyes: Brown & Polson

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Brown & Polson introduced corn flour to Britain.

Brown & Polson introduce corn flour to Britain
Starch manufacturers John Polson (1800 – 1843), William Polson (1810 – 1893) and John Brown (1806 -1889) merged their interests to form Brown & Polson with a factory at Thrushcraig in Paisley, Scotland from 1842.

Brown & Polson had been appointed starch manufacturer to Queen Victoria by 1853.

John Polson Jr (1825 – 1900) discovered a method for manufacturing pure starch from maize, which he called corn flour. He patented the process in 1854. It was the first corn flour to be manufactured in Britain. Advertised as a substitute for arrowroot, corn flour was used as a thickening agent for foods, and used to make custard, blancmange, puddings and cakes.

Production was relocated to the Royal Starch Works at Carriagehill, Paisley from 1857. The Thurscraig works were divested.

William Polson left the partnership to enter into starch manufacture independently from 1857.

In a major promotional coup for the business, the influential Dr Hassall confirmed the purity of Brown & Polson corn flour in 1858.

Brown & Polson employed 32 men and 60 women in 1861.

Brown & Polson employed around 200 people by 1871. The business introduced a profit-sharing scheme for its workforce from 1873.

By 1879 the partners were John Polson Jr, John Brown and John Armour Brown (1839 – 1924).

John Polson Jr was a practical and thrifty man, as well as a generous benefactor.

John Polson
John Polson Jr (1825 – 1900)

John Armour Brown was head of the business by 1881. He was a strong, practical man, with a keen intellect.

Brown & Polson employed 277 people in 1881, including 89 men, 14 women, 86 boys and 88 girls.

Brown & Polson converted the by-product of corn flour manufacture into animal feed, which by 1884 had become a significant part of the business in its own right.

Brown & Polson was considered an enlightened employer. The firm was proud to announce in 1893 that a worker had never encountered the loss of a life or a limb in their factories, and the workforce had never gone on strike.

Brown & Polson office building, Paisley
Brown & Polson office building, Paisley

Currie & Co, starch and corn flour manufacturer of Murray Street, Paisley, was acquired from the executrix of James Currie Auchencloss in 1897.

John Polson Jr died with an estate valued at £349,059 in 1900.

Brown & Polson acquired William Polson & Co in 1904.

Brown & Polson is formed as a private company
Brown & Polson Limited was formed as a private company with a capital of £500,000 in 1920.

William Wotherspoon, a Paisley starch manufacturer, was acquired in 1923. William Mackean, another Paisley starch manufacturer, was also acquired.

John Armour Brown died with an estate valued at £231,654 in 1924.

Brown & Polson had branched out into blancmange powder by 1933.

Share capital was increased to £600,000 in 1935.

Brown & Polson is acquired by Corn Products Co
Corn Products Co of the United States, which had a factory at Trafford Park, Manchester, acquired Brown & Polson in 1935.

The head office was relocated to Wellington House, 125-130 the Strand, London, from 1946.

Brown & Polson sold 200,000 tons of starch a year by 1952.

The William Mackean factory in Paisley was closed in 1954.

The Wotherspoon factory at Maxwellton, Paisley was closed in 1957. 40 staff were relocated to the Brown & Polson factory, but 170 jobs were lost.

Corn Products Co merged with Bestfoods of America in 1959.

A massive explosion at the Paisley animal feeding-stuff drying plant killed five men in 1962. 900 workers were employed at the factory, and fatalities would have been much higher if the incident had occurred during the day shift.

Brown & Polson employed over 500 people in 1962. The head office was relocated to Claygate, Surrey from 1963.

A £750,000 extension of the Paisley site was completed in 1964.

Brown & Polson acquired Frank Cooper, an Oxford marmalade manufacturer for £866,250 in cash in 1964. Marmalade production was relocated to the Brown & Polson factory in Paisley from 1967.

Knorr stock cubes and soups were manufactured at Paisley from the mid-1960s.

Brown & Polson held the licence to manufacture Gerber baby food for the British market between 1965 and 1979. The company held 13 percent of the British baby food market in 1969.

A Brown & Polson instant custard powder was introduced from 1978.

Brown & Polson blancmange mix was discontinued in Britain in the 1990s.

The Paisley factory employed 450 people in 1992, mostly in the manufacture of Knorr stock cubes and Hellmann’s mayonnaise.

Knorr production was relocated to more modern plants in France and Italy from 1993, with the loss of 345 jobs in Paisley.

Closure of the Paisley factory and sale to Premier Foods
Unilever acquired Corn Products Co (by now known as Bestfoods) in 2000.

The Paisley factory was closed in 2002. 66 jobs were lost as mayonnaise production was relocated to the Netherlands.

Unilever sold Brown & Polson to Premier Foods in 2003.

Brown & Polson corn flour is still available in Britain and India.

Soft drinks

Soda, so good: W A Ross of Belfast

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W A Ross was one of the largest soft drinks manufacturers in Ireland.

William Adolphus Ross (1817 – 1900) was born in Dublin, the son of Henry Ross, a banker.

W A Ross worked as managing director of the Belfast factory of Cantrell & Cochrane for nine years. The branch became the largest soft drink manufacturer in Belfast. Ross was described as “able and courteous” by a visitor from the Northern Whig in 1876.

A dispute arose between Ross and his employer. Cantrell & Cochrane were found to be in breach of contract, and Ross was awarded a settlement of £3,250.

Ross used the cash to establish his own soft drinks manufacturing business at William Street South, Belfast, in 1879. The site was chosen due to its access to spring water and proximity to the docks. He was assisted by his son George Harrison Ross (1845 – 1917), a former sailor.

W A Ross was producing nearly 30,000 bottles a day by November 1879, with production largely destined for export markets such as the United States, the West Indies and Africa.

A depot had been established at Glasgow by 1881.

Another son, William Adolphus Ross Jr (1843 – 1912), settled in Staten Island and worked as the sales agent for New York. 981,840 bottles were imported into New York in 1883.

W A Ross had become one of the largest soft drink manufacturers in Ireland by 1891. Ross’s Royal Ginger Ale was the firm’s principal product. That year the firm became a private limited company, W A Ross & Sons Ltd.

W A Ross & Sons employed 150 people in 1896. The company had depots at Glasgow and Liverpool by 1898.

William Adolphus Ross died in 1900 with an estate valued at £4,449. George Harrison Ross became managing director of the company.

The William Street factory was extended in 1902, and again in 1909.

William Adolphus Ross Jr died in 1912 with an estate valued at £65,000. He was succeeded by his son, Conway Ross (1883 – c.1975).

Brazil, Chile and Argentina were major export destinations by 1914, but the United States remained the most important foreign market. However, the disruption caused by the First World War was to damage the export trade.

The Republic of Ireland gained independence in 1919, and trade to this major market was damaged when import tariffs were introduced.

Conway Ross stepped down as managing director in 1973. He was succeeded by his son, Dermot Conway Ross (1915 – 1979) and grandson, Oscar C Ross (born 1948) as joint-managing directors.

W A Ross & Sons merged with Belfast rival Cochran’s of Ravenhill Avenue to form Ross Cochran in 1975. Dermot Conway Ross took the opportunity to retire, and Oscar Ross was appointed as sales director of the new company.

All production was centralised at Cochran’s. A £300,000 investment was made to double bottling capacity. Around 100 people were employed on a six acre site.

Ross Cochran was acquired by Cantrell & Cochrane in 1986. After a few years the Ross brand was phased out.

Soft drinks

The sparkling history of Cantrell & Cochrane

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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.

Soft drinks

Welsh fire: Idris & Co

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How did Idris & Co became one of the largest soft drinks manufacturers in the world?

Idris & Co is established
Thomas Howell Williams (1842 – 1925) was born in Vallen, Pembrokeshire, the son of a Baptist farmer. As his first language was Welsh, he did not learn to speak English until he was eight years old.

At the age of twelve Williams was apprenticed to a cousin in Crickhowell who worked as a chemist. Williams was restless and ambitious, and relocated to London to work for a well-known firm of chemists in 1863.

Williams entered into business for himself with a chemist shop on Seven Sisters Road from 1870. It was there that he first introduced soft drinks under the Idris brand, named after a Welsh mountain.

Thomas Howell Williams Idris (1842 – 1925), c.1905

Manufacturing chemists of the era often produced soft drinks, which were purported to have medical benefits. Ginger ale, Coca-Cola and Dr Pepper were all created by chemists.

The soft drinks arm was to prove successful, and Williams divested his chemist business and established Idris & Co, soft drink manufacturers, on Pratt Street, Camden Town, in 1875. Lemonade, ginger ale and soda water were the principal products. The business expanded quickly, and the factory site was repeatedly extended.

Idris & Co introduced a generous profit-sharing scheme for its 500 employees in 1891. Workers received wages 10 to 15 percent higher than the industry average, and conditions at their factory were described as superior. Workers received overtime pay during the peak summer season, and maintained full time hours during the slack winter period.

Idris & Co is incorporated
Idris & Co was incorporated with a nominal capital of £100,000 in 1892. The company was one of the largest soft drinks manufacturers in the world, and operated the largest soft drinks factory in England. The factory employed two automated carbonated soft drink filling machines, which were designed by Thomas Idris himself.

Williams added Idris to his surname by deed poll in 1893.

The business nearly doubled in size between 1895 and 1897. Additional factories had been established at Southampton by 1896 and at Liverpool by 1898.

A public offering raised company capital to £150,000 in 1897. The company held a Royal Warrant to supply Queen Victoria by 1897.

Cadair Idris in the Snowdonia National Park, Wales, after which the soft drink brand was named. Image from Wikimedia Commons.

Idris & Co had a share capital of £216,000 by 1900. The company employed almost 1,000 people, including nearly 200 at the Camden Town factory. Five million bottles of carbonated soft drinks were sold, as well as millions of non-carbonated drinks. There were depots at Teddington, Watford, Reigate, Folkestone, Portsmouth and Bournemouth. That year, an additional factory was opened at Canterbury.

Horse-driven carts limited distribution to within a 17 mile radius. Motorised transportation was introduced from 1901.

Politically, Thomas Idris was a radical and a progressive. He invited representatives of the Social Democratic Federation and the National Democratic League to inspect his wages bill in 1902. They declared that Idris & Co paid the highest wages in the industry, that retired workers received pensions and that the profit-sharing scheme had distributed thousands of pounds to staff.

Thomas Idris was appointed Mayor of St Pancras in 1904-5. He served as the Liberal Member of Parliament for Flintshire from 1906 to 1910.

Idris & Co held a Royal Warrant to supply Edward VII by 1905.

120 women and girls at the Camden Town factory came out on strike in protest at the dismissal of an employee in 1911. The strikers agreed to an independent review of the case by the Board of Trade. The review cleared Idris & Co of any wrongdoing.

Idris & Co was distributing soft drinks within a 50 mile radius of its Camden Town factory by 1912. Depots were situated at Watford, Teddington, Enfield and Southend. The company had over one million bottles. The company had 21 lorries by 1914.

Idris “Fiery” ginger beer (2018)

Idris & Co held a Royal Warrant to supply George V by 1916.

Thomas Idris died with an estate valued at £30,317 in 1925. He was succeeded as chairman by his son, Walter Howell Williams Idris (1875 – 1939).

Idris & Co established a new depot at Chelmsford, Essex in 1936.

Walter Idris died in 1939, with a gross estate valued at £20,230.

Later history and acquisition of the business
Ivor Trevena Idris (1911 – 1993), the grandson of the late founder, was appointed company chairman from 1943.

Coca-Cola Bottlers of Scotland was acquired in 1961.

Idris ranked among the second-tier of national soft drinks producers, behind Schweppes, J Lyons and Beecham, but alongside R White & Sons and Tizer.

Idris entered into a joint-venture with Fuller Smith & Turner, the London brewer, for the 7 Up bottling franchise for London and the South East in 1964.

The antiquated Camden Town factories were closed in 1965, and production was relocated to a new site at White Hart Lane, Tottenham.

Idris & Co made a loss of £348,000 in 1965-6, following problems establishing the new factory, and a fire at the Coca-Cola Scotland plant.

Idris & Co was acquired by Beecham, which owned the Lucozade, Ribena and Corona soft drinks brands, in 1967. The Idris range included shandy, ginger beer and mixers by the mid-1970s.

Britvic acquired the Beecham soft drinks business in 1987. Idris “Fiery” ginger beer continued to be sold until 2019, when it was quietly withdrawn from the market.

Soft drinks

On the rocks: H D Rawlings

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H D Rawlings was one of the largest and most prestigious soft drinks manufacturers in Victorian England.

The Rawlings family
Rawlings & Co claimed an establishment date of 1815 in a press advertisement from 1860.

John Rawlings (1771 – 1848), ginger beer manufacturer, was certainly based at Nassau Street, Fitzrovia by 1827. The exact address is confirmed as 2 Nassau Street by 1831. Ginger beer was supplied in stone bottles.

John Rawlings died in 1848 and the business passed to his sons, John Rawlings Jr (1806 – 1853) and James Rawlings (1814 – 1882). The business employed 20 men by 1851.

John Rawlings Jr died in 1853 and his stake in the business was inherited by his widow, Sarah Rawlings (1819 – 1863).

Henry Doo (1836 – 1904) joined the business as a clerk from 1855.

The business occupied 2-4 Nassau Street by 1856, and the range of drinks had been expanded to include lemonade and soda, as well as ginger beer.

H D Rawlings
Sarah Rawlings married Henry Doo in 1857, and he took her last name to become Henry Doo Rawlings.

Premises had extended to include 8 Charles Street, Fitzrovia by 1860.

At the instigation of James Rawlings, a works’ brass band was established in 1862. The firm enjoyed a strong relationship with its workforce, which it treated to an annual dinner or excursion.

Sarah Doo (nee Rawlings) died in September 1863, with an estate valued at under £7,000. H D Rawlings became the principal partner in the firm, although James Rawlings also had a stake, and the firm traded as H D & J Rawlings.

Less than four months after the death of his wife, Henry Doo Rawlings married Jane Sewell in Paris. Henry Doo Rawlings was described as “lively, open-hearted and genial, easily approached, with no manifest sense of self-importance”. James Rawlings was described as more reserved, “but thoroughly cordial and kind when the ice was broken”.

The firm was a generous contributor to the Licensed Victuallers Asylum, a charity for retired victuallers.

H D & J Rawlings held a Royal Warrant to supply Queen Victoria with soft drinks by 1864. The firm supplied the Prince of Wales, the Duke of Edinburgh and the Emperor of France by 1869.

James Rawlings retired in 1870, and the firm was continued under the name H D Rawlings.

Following a gas explosion at the Nassau Street factory in 1877. Henry Doo Rawlings and two other men received burns to their faces and hands. Rawlings was examined by Sir James Paget (1814 – 1899), who believed it unlikely that the man would survive; to the doctor’s astonishment he made a full recovery.

The firm was based at 2 Nassau Street and Berners Street in 1879.

Henry Doo Rawlings was granted the Freedom of the City of London in 1886.

Draught ginger beer was introduced from 1887.

H D Rawlings is sold to R White & Sons
R White & Sons of Camberwell acquired H D Rawlings in 1891. The business was incorporated as a limited company at this time. The Rawlings brand continued as the premium offering alongside the standard market R White’s soft drinks. Henry Doo Rawlings retired from the business to become vice chairman of Meredith & Drew, a biscuit manufacturer.

H D Rawlings claimed that it could supply up to 120,000 stone bottles of ginger beer within a few hours notice in 1892. The Rawlings factory was on Neate Street, Camberwell by 1894.

Henry Doo Rawlings died from erysipelas in Paris in 1904. He left an estate valued at over £47,000.

H D Rawlings was based at 8 Mortimer Street, Fitzrovia and Neate Street, Camberwell in 1914. The company employed about 400 people.

The licensed trade in the London area was the principal customer for H D Rawlings products by 1952.

R White & Sons was acquired by Whitbread, a national brewer, in 1969.

By the mid-1970s the Rawlings brand was primarily being marketed as a mixer for spirits, and was largely affiliated with the on-trade of clubs, hotels and public houses.

Whitbread and Bass merged their soft drinks operations to form Canada Dry Rawlings in 1980. Bass owned 65 percent of the venture and Whitbread owned the remainder. The business concentrated on supplying the licensed trade.

Britvic acquired Canada Dry Rawlings in 1986. Britvic phased out the Rawlings name in favour of the Britvic brand.

Britvic has been known to trace its origins to the establishment of the Rawlings business.

Soft drinks

Popular: Ben Shaw’s of Huddersfield

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Ben Shaw’s is one of the few regional survivors of the British soft drink industry. 30 million cans of Ben Shaw’s soft drinks are sold every year.

Benjamin Shaw establishes the business
Benjamin Shaw (1836 – 1901) was born at Kirkheaton, Huddersfield, the son of a farm labourer. He found work in the Huddersfield textile trade, initially as a woollen spinner, and then as a supervisor.

benshaw
Benjamin Shaw (1836 – 1901)

Benjamin Shaw established a partnership with his brother George Shaw from 1871, bottling Pennine spring water from premises on Charles Street, Huddersfield.

The first delivery was made to Thornton’s Temperance Hotel at 21 New Street, Huddersfield.

Soon, the firm expanded into non-alcoholic “botanic” porter and ginger beer, distributing their products by horse and cart.

Benjamin Shaw bought out his brother’s stake in the partnership for £317 in 1876, to become sole proprietor of the business. The firm employed seven men in 1881.

Shaw was a keen advocate of the temperance movement. He supported good causes, such as the establishment of a working men’s club in Huddersfield. He was nominated as a member of Huddersfield Town Council in 1881.

The firm relocated to a new factory on Upperhead Row, Huddersfield in 1883.

Production was relocated to a purpose-built factory on Willow Lane, Huddersfield from 1894. By this time the firm traded as Benjamin Shaw & Sons.

Shaw’s two sons takeover the business
Benjamin Shaw died in 1901, and left an estate of £6,955. He was succeeded in business by his two sons, Ernest (1858 – 1924) and Frank Shaw (born 1870).

A view of the Ben Shaw’s factory at Willow Lane (2007)

Benjamin Shaw & Sons was registered as a private company with capital of £20,000 in 1913.

Ernest Shaw died in 1924 with an estate valued at over £20,500. Beaumont Stephenson (1877 – 1948), a son-in-law of Benjamin Shaw, took charge of the company.

Clifford Stephenson takes control, and expands the business
Clifford Stephenson (1902 – 1992) took control of the company following the death of his father in 1948. Stephenson was a lifelong Methodist.

Stephenson became alderman of Huddersfield, and played a major role in the redevelopment of the town.

Distribution was extended into the neighbouring county of Lancashire in 1957.

From around this time the soft drinks were rebranded as “Ben Shaw’s”.

Ben Shaw’s became the first company in Europe to can soft drinks from 1959.

A new fully-automated factory was opened at Brockholes near Huddersfield in 1966. It could produce 100,000 cans a day and employed a staff of just 30. Between 1966 and 1971 sales doubled. Yellow lemonade was the highest-seller, and dandelion & burdock remained popular. The business remained essentially local in scope.

Ben Shaw’s held around three percent of the British carbonated soft drinks market by 1989.

Loss of family control, subsequent owners and closure of the Willow Lane factory
Overexpansion saw capital run low. Ben Shaw’s had excellent facilities, but lacked sufficient sales. The family were forced to sell control of the business to Rutland Trust, a turnaround specialist led by Michael Langdon, for £5.7 million in 1993.

Langdon sold a 51 percent stake in the Pontefract canning operation to Cott Beverages of Canada for £6 million in 1994.

Langdon negotiated new distribution deals with the major supermarkets chains, and was the leading supplier of own-label sparkling water by 1997.

The Willow Lane site was acquired by Britvic in 2004 when it bought the Ben Shaw’s bottled water business, including the Pennine Spring brand.

Cott Beverages of Canada acquired full control of Ben Shaw’s in 2005.

Britvic closed the Willow Lane factory in 2013. Production of the Pennine Spring bottled water brand was discontinued.

Cott was acquired by Refresco in 2017.

Hospitality

Night on the tiles: Slaters restaurants

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Slaters became one of the largest catering companies in the world.

Slaters
Thomas Slater (1794 – 1866) had established a butchers business on Kensington High Street by 1819.

The business received a Royal Warrant to supply Queen Victoria from 1837. Soon, Slater supplied a large proportion of the Royal Family, and twelve of the leading gentlemen’s clubs in London.

The business was probably one of the largest and most prestigious butchers shops in Britain by 1845.

Thomas Slater died in 1866, and the business continued to be operated by his sons.

John Crowle acquires and expands Slaters
John Crowle (1841 – 1906) was the son of William Crowle, a butcher and farmer of 25 acres at Charlestown, Cornwall.

John Crowle worked at his father’s butchers shop in St Austell. He relocated to London in 1869 and operated a butchers shop. His brother Thomas Crowle (1826 – 1877) had already moved to London, and managed a butchers shop on Newington Green Road.

John Crowle partnered with Thomas Crowle and acquired Slaters from Alfred Slater (born 1830) in 1872. The business was substantial, with a turnover of £75,000 a year.

John Crowle bought out his brother’s stake in the business in 1873.

Through energy, enthusiasm and perseverance, John Crowle’s butcher’s shop prospered. He employed thirteen men at his shop by 1881. Crowle added a restaurant on the upper floor of the shop. Soon, further outlets were established across the West End of London.

Slaters became a limited company from 1889. Outlets were located around central London, with a flagship restaurant in Piccadilly. The restaurants targeted the upper middle and lower upper class markets.

Crowle was a staunch Wesleyan Methodist and temperance advocate, and as a result his restaurants did not serve alcohol. As diners did not linger over drinks, the restaurants enjoyed a faster turnover of customers, and a lunchtime table could be filled up to six times.

There were eleven Slaters outlets by 1900, mostly located in the City of London, but also in West London and the West End. The restaurants had elegant interiors with white tablecloths and napkins.

The loss-making ice cream business was sold to Carlo Gatti & Stevenson Ltd in 1901.

John Crowle died in 1906. His estate was valued at £448,696, half of which he gifted to the temperance movement in his will (he had lost his only son to typhoid fever during the Boer War). It was one of the largest bequests to date in Britain.

Slaters becomes one of the largest catering companies in the world
Slaters had 21 restaurants and sold 120,000 meals a week by 1907.

The company struggled in the period following the death of Crowle. After a massive decline in profits, the managing director, William Kirkland, was dismissed in 1911.

Alcohol licences had been introduced to at least some of the Slaters restaurants by 1912.

Slaters operated thirteen à la carte restaurants and nearly 40 grocery outlets, all located within London and its suburbs, by 1913. The company had capital of £355,000.

Slaters operated 60 outlets, and had an annual turnover of over £600,000 by 1916. This included the largest fishmonger business in Britain, and the largest poulterers business in London, which together had 26 branches and a turnover of nearly £200,000 a year. Fish was supplied to many leading hotels and restaurants throughout London.

The First World War saw the customer base eroded, and many of the restaurants became loss-making.

Slaters was one of the largest catering companies in the world by 1926. A freehold property on Oxford Street was acquired for £100,000 in 1928.

Slaters acquires Bodega
The authorised capital of Slaters was increased to £1 million in order to acquire Bodega, a restaurant company, in 1928. The merged company was known as Slaters & Bodega. The acquisition brought with it 30 outlets, and two hotels, one in Yarmouth and one in Eastbourne. The catering businesses were complementary, and it was anticipated that there would be efficiency savings across management and overheads.

The Slaters on Kensington High Street became a favourite restaurant of the Irish novelist James Joyce (1882 – 1941) in 1931.

Slaters & Bodega operated three provincial hotels, 29 Slater Restaurants and Beta Cafes, 37 shops, 25 Bodega wine bars and four Cope’s wine lodges by 1932.

War-time struggles, and acquisition by Charles Forte
The Second World War had a severe impact upon Slaters & Bodega. 92 out of 119 company outlets had been damaged or destroyed by enemy action by May 1941. War-time conditions also seriously impacted upon sales.

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Slaters & Bodega became the subject of takeover speculation, and was acquired by Charles Forte (1908 – 2007), an Italian entrepreneur with interests in catering and property, for £1.55 million in 1954. Financial backing from Ind Coope, a large brewer and owner of public houses, helped Forte to almost double the size of his catering empire.

Forte immediately divested the Slaters fish and vegetable shops, however Slaters & Bodega continued as a subsidiary of the Forte empire until at least 1964.

Footwear

A history of John White shoes

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John White was the largest shoemaking company in Britain.

John White enters the shoe trade
John White (1885 – 1974) was born into a strict Calvinist Baptist family. His ancestors had been engaged in the shoemaking trade since the mid-eighteenth century.

White was trained as a clicker, one who cuts the uppers of shoes and boots from leather. He cut the uppers of 650,000 pairs of shoes and boots before 1918.

White went into business for himself from 1918. He bought a small workshop in Rushden, Northamptonshire using savings of £200. He acquired a shoe press in 1919, and by the end of the year he had three employees.

White acquired small local factories during a trade slump. His business produced 100,000 pairs of boots and shoes by 1921.

The John White brand is introduced
John White launched his own brand of shoes in 1930. He promoted the new brand with national advertising.

John White was the largest shoemaking business in Britain by 1935. The Rushden factories employed 1,200 people, and 1.75 million pairs of shoes were manufactured each year.

White acquired a factory at Higham Ferrers, Northamptonshire, from Owen Parker in 1936. Adjacent offices were constructed.

John White supplied both armies during the Spanish Civil War (1936 – 1939). Each side placed orders for 100,000 pairs of shoes.

White undercut his competitors by efficiently cutting costs and accepting low margins. He avoided trade union disruption by paying for piecework; payment for work completed, rather than basic wages.

White built a new factory on Lime Street, Rushden in 1939. It was designed by Albert Richardson (1880 -1964), a leading architect whose work included the Manchester Opera House.

John White had nine factories, a staff of nearly 2,000 and production of three million pairs of boots and shoes a year by 1941.

During the Second World War the business sold over eight million pairs of boots to the armed forces; one ninth of all footwear supplied to the troops.

White sells directly to retailers
Wholesalers were not marketing his product as effectively, so White began to sell directly to retailers after the Second World War. Profits mounted rapidly. The company employed 2,600 people by 1951.

John White was exporting 400,000 pairs of shoes a year to America by the 1950s, and the company accounted for 90 percent of British footwear exports. John White shoes were exported to 56 territories.

Expansion saw a factory opened in Corby, Northamptonshire in 1954.

White was a dynamic man, and had an obsession for efficiency. He invested heavily to ensure that he used the most modern shoe manufacturing equipment available.

John White retires; later history
John White retired in 1962. The company initially struggled in his absence, but had regained profitability by 1968.

George Ward of Leicester was acquired for £4 million in 1972. The name of the company was changed to Ward White Group.

G B Britton, a large footwear manufacturer, was acquired in 1973.

Ward White was the third largest footwear manufacturer in Britain in 1974. The company had 9,000 employees across nine countries.

The Ward White footwear business was subject to a management buyout, called UK Safety, in 1988.

The last remaining John White shoe factory closed in 1991.

The John White brand was revived in 2000.