First World problem – Cadbury’s or Nestlé’s?
For children of the Fifties and Sixties growing up in the West, the preference of chocolate usually came down to a shelf choice between Cadbury and Nestlé. My recollection is that my own juvenile palate tended towards Nestlé, but only partly due to taste…yes I did have an oral appreciation of Nestlé’s slim, pocket-size milk chocolate bars but Nestlé was also great for youthful card collectors. Each bar contained a different colour card that you could paste into your Nestlé Car Club book or Sky Club book or into their “Conquest of Space” series book. A glance at the enduring popularity of Cadbury’s chocolate is confirmation that the British confectioner did not miss my preference for their Swiss rival.

(photo courtesy of www.historyworld.co.uk)

As a child I was very aware that Cadbury’s had a chocolate factory in Tasmania (known as “the factory in the garden”)…the idyllic image of rustic Claremont was imprinted in my head courtesy of innumerable Cadbury TV ads (as a visual treat great scenery plus chocolate is always hard to top!) What I wasn’t aware of as a young chocolate consumer was that that Cadbury’s (nay, almost all of the English pioneering chocolate manufacturing industry!) was a Quaker company. Cadbury’s kicked off from a small shop in Birmingham, England, in 1824, but before Cadbury’s there was Fry’s Chocolates which opened its first shop in Bristol in 1761, and after it Rowntree’s (established 1862, in York✲). All of these chocolatiers were founded by English Quakers and the companies business ethos imbued with the Quaker philosophy.

(photo courtesy of www.historyworld.co.uk)

In business by circumstance and conviction British Quakers in the 19th century not only cornered the chocolate market, they excelled in business in a multiplicity of fields, ranging from banking (Barclays, Lloyds) to biscuit manufacturing (Huntley and Palmers, Carrs) to footwear (Clarks’ Shoes) to match manufacturing (Bryant and May) [‘How did Quakers conquer the British sweet shop?’, (Peter Jackson), BBC News Magazine, 20-Jan-2010, www.bbc.com].

The circumstance that Quakers found themselves in guided their decision to embrace the world of business. As a Christian non-conformist group in a sea of English Anglicanism, adherents of the Quaker faith in the 1800s were subjected to the systematic discrimination befalling religious outsiders – exclusion from the universities (until the 1870s) meant the leading professions of medicine and law was barred to them. Naturally enough, this barrier to the industrious, go-ahead Quaker person, turned them towards business and commerce [ibid.].

The senior Cadbury ⤋

Kings of the chocolate business ❇
The Quaker philosophy incorporates a commitment to social reform and the pursuit of justice and equality. This ethos informed their business practices, Cadbury’s and other Quaker firms established a reputation for being honest and reliable. This gave them a competitive advantage over their non-Quaker competitors. The perceived ethical nature of Quaker confectionery firms was rewarded with customer loyalty. John Cadbury and his successors were among the first to set a firm (and fair) price – this was a clear departure from the hitherto customary retail practice of point-of-sale price bartering [ibid.]✥.

Cocoa the health drink
Founder Cadbury started off mainly selling cocoa drinks (solid chocolate came later)…this was borne out of 19th century social concerns – a Quaker (by definition teetotal) response to the “perceived misery and deprivation caused by alcohol” in British society (Helen Rowlands, Quaker historian)⍓. The Cadburys marketed cocoa as a cheap available drink, one that was healthy (the process involved boiling thus removing the impurities lurking in the dubious public water supplies of the day)[ibid.]☯.

Democratising cocoa and drinking chocolate Cocoa and drinking chocolate had been around in England since the 1650s but before Cadbury’s came along it had been a luxury beverage for the elite. John Cadbury’s improvements to the product gave it more varieties and made it a more palatable drink, and after the Gladstone government reduced taxes on imported cocoa beans in the mid 1850s, the cost of cocoa became within the reach of the greater majority of Britons. Cadbury’s introduction of unadulterated “cocoa essence” in the 1870s coincided with a government crackdown on the widespread adulteration of food in the UK. The upshot was free ‘plugs’ for the purer Cadbury product and a boost in fortunes for the Quaker business [‘The Story of Cadbury. Early Days – A One Man Business’, www.cadbury.com.au].

Even ‘Lancet’ was lavish in it’s praise of Cadbury’s Cocoa ⤋(photo courtesy of www.historyworld.co.uk)

Worker welfare and satisfaction a priority The Cadbury brothers (Richard and George, sons of the founder) placed an uncommon degree of emphasis on the fitness and health of their workforce (again philosophically driven by their faith). After moving their factory to a greenfields site south of Birmingham to cope with the business’ growth, George built the Bourneville village in the vicinity – this was a model village community for Cadbury’s workers – replete with schools, leisure facilities (including a lido) and parks, canteen, a carillon and its Friends meeting house. Cadbury’s employed doctors and dentists for the benefit of Bourneville employees and was among the first to pioneer pension schemes for their workforce [Jackson, loc.cit.]. The village included attractive “Arts and Crafts” style cottages in picturesque surrounds, but no pubs were permitted on the Bourneville estate⍟.The Bourneville factory ⤊

Chocolate you can eat! Cadbury Dairy Milk Richard and George’s acquisition of a new cocoa press reduced the cocoa butter content, further improving the taste of the Cadbury cocoa drink. The press also helped Cadbury’s make a breakthrough with eating chocolate in the 1890s…learning from the Swiss prototype (Nestlé), it started to create milk chocolate bars to rival those on the Continent. In 1905 Cadbury’s introduced Dairy Milk Chocolate which would go on to become it’s and the UK’s top selling chocolate bar (60% UK market share in 1936). DCM, together with Bourneville Cocoa, have established themselves as Cadbury’s two stand-out, iconic products in the history of the company [‘The Story of Cadbury’, loc.cit.; Deborah Cadbury, The Chocolate Wars: The 150-Year Rivalry Between the World’s Greatest Chocolate Makers, (2010)].

(photo courtesy of www.historyworld.co.uk)

Following success came expansion – in 1918 Cadbury’s opened a new factory in Tasmania (the first outside the UK). In 1910 Cadbury’s finally overtook J.S.Fry & Sons in chocolate and cocoa sales…Fry’s got the block of solid chocolate right before Cadbury’s but the legendary “glass and a half” merchants surged ahead in the end. [ibid.]. So much so that Cadbury’s acquired its biggest domestic rival in 1919 (giving it Fry’s top lines, ‘Chocolate Cream’ and ‘Turkish Delight’). In 1967 Cadbury’s added the Australian chocolate manufacturer MacRobertson (‘Freddo’, ‘Snack’)✴

Family Fry and partners
The Fry chocolate business was another dynastic Anglo-Quaker confectioner. The original Joseph Fry started the company in the mid Georgian period in Britain, taking on a partner, John Vaughan. Upon Fry’s death his widow Anna Fry took over the family business and the firm name changed to Anna Fry & Son. Joseph Storrs Fry succeeded her and partnered with a Dr Hunt. Storrs Fry patented a method of grinding cocoa beans using a Watt steam engine. The company then devolved to his sons, Joseph, Francis and Richard, as joint partners. Under the next generation of Frys (Joseph Storrs Fry II), the business reached its commercial pinnacle before it got absorbed into the vast Cadbury empire [‘J.S.Fry & Sons’, Wikipedia, http://en.m.wikipedia.org].

Shadowing Cadbury’s, the rise of Rowntree’s Rowntree’s, Cadbury’s other domestic rival in the sweets trade, was the creation of Henry Rowntree. Like Cadbury’s Rowntree applied Quaker principles to his business and always insisted on the best quality ingredients [‘Rowntree’s’, Wikipedia, http://en.m.wikipedia.org]. Joseph Rowntree, Henry’s brother, joined as partner in 1869, and being a staunch advocate of social reform, steered some of the firm’s profits towards his Quaker philanthropy. The company’s first big success was with ‘Fruit Pastilles’ and ‘Fruit Gums’ which allowed it to follow Cadbury’s earlier move in purchasing a Van Houten press. This enabled Rowntree’s to produce chocolate sans cocoa butter, so as to compete with Cadbury’s successful ‘Cocoa Essence’ [Robert Fitzgerald, Rowntree and the Marketing Revolution, 1862-1969, (2007)].Rowntree’s, as their rival Cadbury’s did, created a dynasty of chocolatiers, merchants, philanthropists and social reformers – succeeding sons and brothers kept the family name at the helm of the company (Joseph Rowntree Jr, Henry Issac Rowntree, John Stephenson Rowntree).

Rowntree’s later created the consumer favourites ‘Kit Kat’, ‘Aero’ and ‘Smarties’, and went on its own expansion journey, merging with the Halifax “Toffee King” Mackintosh in 1969 (which added ‘Quality Street’ and ‘Rolo’ to its product inventory). Rowntree’s (rebranded Rowntree Mackintosh Confectionery) then acquired Australian chocolate manufacturer Hoadley’s (1972) which gave RMC Hoadley’s ‘Violet Crumble’ bar.

Rowntree’s introduced the ‘Yorkie’ bar in the Seventies which put a serious dent in Cadbury Dairy Milk’s market share and contributed to Rowntree’s reaching fourth spot in the world chocolate manufacturers’ ladder by the Eighties▣. This was Rowntree’s apogee however as it’s underperforming shares saw it fall victim to a successful takeover from the Swiss giant Nestlé in 1988 [‘Rowntree’s’, op.cit.].

Nestlé’s Yorkie and a dubious sales pitch – the “Nestlé Goliath” was clearly tone deaf to the value of being inclusive when they designed this, a chocolate bar which discriminates on the grounds of gender? ⤋

A British institution undone
Cadbury’s, despite its continuing success, in 2010 suffered the same fate as Rowntree – swallowed up by another Goliath of the food business, US’ Kraft Foods (operating now as Mondelēz International). The loss of Cadbury’s, a household name in British manufacturing for 186 years, was highly controversial, causing an outcry in the UK. What was especially galling to many patriotic Brits was that Kraft had to borrow £7bn to seal the acquisition deal, and the banker brokering the financial transaction was itself British – the Royal Bank of Scotland [Deborah Cadbury, op.cit].

FN: Pseudo-Quakers
The runaway commercial success of Quaker food and confectionery companies did inevitably lead to imitation. A US food manufacturer in the 1870s introduced “Quaker Oats” to the cereal market…on the packets and in product advertising are images of a man dressed in Quaker garb, despite the US company having NO connexion with the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) whatsoever♉. The company states that it chose the “Quaker Man” as its figurehead “because the Quaker faith projected the values of honesty, integrity, purity and strength”, [‘Quaker Oats website’, (FAQ 2009), www.quakeroats.com] (an early example of retail “identity theft’ to try to cash in commercially on the high regard Quaker businessmen were held in).

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PostScript: Third World cocoa beans and the Quaker chocolatiers – an uncomfortable association
In the late 19th century the Cadbury brothers and other British chocolate-makers started exporting a large proportion of their cocoa beans from the islands of São Tomé and Príncipe (Portuguese West Africa)…by the turn of the century this amounted to 55% of Cadbury’s total supply of beans. Although Portugal had abolished slavery in its colonies, the rigid labour contract system which replaced left the African labourers working the plantations in a de facto slave status. This uncomfortable connexion of an ethical Quaker business to neo-slavery prompted one of the managing grandsons, William Cadbury, to commission an investigation of worker conditions in São Tomé and Príncipe in the 1900s. Cadbury eventually found an alternative source of cocoa beans (the Gold Coast) and organised a boycott of the two Portuguese plantations, but not before he had to fend off a spate of newspaper attacks on Cadbury’s alleging that it profited from the labour of slaves [‘William Cadbury, Chocolate, and Slavery in Portuguese West Africa’, (Lindsey Flewelling), 11-May-2016, https://britishandirishhistory.wordpress.com/2016/05/11/william-cadbury-chocolate-and-slavery-in-portuguese-west-africa/].

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(photo courtesy of www.historyworld.co.uk)

✲ the non-Quaker exception to this was Terry’s (established 1767, York, UK), famous for “Terry’s Chocolate Orange” and now owned by Kraft Foods

❇ the Quaker chocolatiers’ success was remarkably out of proportion to their numbers…with Quakers just one in fourteen out of a total UK population of 21M in 1851, they comprised >0.1% of the population [Jackson, loc.cit.]

✥ descendant and family historian Deborah Cadbury states that the Cadbury founder practiced a brand of “Quaker capitalism” that valued hard work and “wealth creation for the benefit of the workers, the local community, and society at large” [Cadbury, op.cit.]

⍓ John Cadbury had a long connexion with the Temperance Society

☯ later with the move into making chocolate bars, what gave the Quaker confectionery businesses an added edge over rival manufacturers was their preparedness to invest in new, state-of-the-art machinery [Jackson, loc.cit.]

⍟ the Cadbury village inspired the American non-Quaker Milton Hershey (a Pennsylvanian Mennonite in fact) to create his own ‘utopian’ village for his chocolate factory workers [Cadbury, op.cit.]

✴ a 1969 merger with soft drink giant Schweppes proved less enduring with the two partners demerging in 2008

▣ behind Mars, Hershey and Cadbury’s

♉ in recent years some brethren of the Quaker movement have objected to the way the company’s advertising depicts Quakers, ‘Quaker Oats Company’, Wikipedia, http://en.m.wikipedia.org]