Chocolate Wars: The 150-Year Rivalry Between the World's Greatest Chocolate Makers (5 page)

Living at the house were Joseph Rowntree’s sons, including twenty-one-year-old Joseph and nineteen-year-old Henry Isaac. Joseph was tall and dark with an intensity of features, the natural severity of his own character complemented by years of Quaker upbringing. His father had taken him to Ireland on a Quaker relief mission in 1850 during the Irish potato famine, and the experience had left a lasting impression. Joseph remembered the look of death as starvation slowly turned the young and comely into the walking dead. Numberless unknown dead lay in open trenches or where they had fallen by the side of the road, alongside those still living, their faces showing their terror. For the serious-minded Joseph, it had been a formative experience and a shocking lesson on the effects of poverty. His younger brother, Henry, formed a contrast to Joseph’s austerity. Somehow the full Puritan weight of Quaker training did not sit quite so readily on his young shoulders; he had a sense of fun and could be relied upon to lighten the mood.

By 1860 George Cadbury had returned to Birmingham, although he had barely completed three years as an apprentice. Whether his father recognized his ability and recalled him to help at home or whether the move was instigated by George because he was hungry to get started is not known.

To the employees at Bridge Street, the two young Cadbury brothers were curiously “alike and unalike.” Richard was seen as “bright and happy with a sunny disposition.” He claimed he would be happy simply to rescue the business and turn it around to make a few hundred pounds a year. George was much more driven. In the words of his biographer, Alfred Gardiner, he “had more of an adventurer’s instinct. . . . The channel of his mind was narrower and the current
swifter.” Despite his ambition, he could see no simple solution. As the brothers deliberated during the spring of 1861 in the gloomy Bridge Street factory, the prospect seemed a dismal one. From their cramped office, they could see the empty carts banked up in the yard awaiting orders. It was not immediately obvious what they could do together that their father and uncle had not already tried and that would make the crucial difference.

The great hope, of course, was to come up with a breakthrough product. They did in fact have something in mind that their father had been working on before family difficulties drained his energy. It was a product very much of the moment, with healthful overtones, called Iceland Moss. The manufacturing process involved blending the fatty chocolate bean with an ingredient that was thought to improve health: lichen. It was fashioned into a bar of cocoa that could then be grated to form a nutritious drink. Richard had a flair for design. He could see the possibilities for launching Iceland Moss. It would be eye-catchingly displayed in bright yellow packaging with black letters that boldly proclaimed the addition of lichen, complete with the image of a reindeer to show how different it was. They aimed to promote the health properties of Iceland Moss, but would the untried combination of fluffy-textured lichen and the very fatty cocoa bean appeal to the English palate?

Apart from developing new products, the brothers also had to find new customers. Their father had only one salesperson, known at the time as a “traveller.” His name was Dixon Hadaway and he alone covered a vast swathe of the country from Rugby in the south high up to the Scottish highlands, visiting grocers’ shops to promote their line of cocoa wares. He took advantage of the new trains to cover the long distances between towns but was also obliged to travel by pony and trap or even on foot. Despite the challenges of getting around, Dixon Hadaway was evidently determined to keep up appearances, smartly attired with a tall top hat and dark tweed coat, although it was invariably crumpled from long hours of travelling. It seems he was appreciated by his customers, who claimed that he was so punctual that they could set their clocks by his visits. But punctuality and enthusiasm
alone were not enough to secure new orders. People could not be expected to buy Cadbury’s goods if they had never heard of them. George was clear. They needed more capital to fund a sales team.

To finance the extra staffing, they discussed how to manage the business more efficiently. The brothers’ solution was to return to their puritanical roots: “work, and again work, and always more work.” George enthusiastically planned to cut all indulgence from his life: games, outings, music, every luxury would go. Every penny he earned would be ploughed back into the business. This was harder for Richard. He was planning to marry in July.

A photograph survives of Richard’s fiancée, Elizabeth Adlington, whose classic good looks are evident in spite of her serious expression and the limitation imposed on any enhancement of feminine Quaker beauty. Her face appears unadorned, her hair parted down the middle and pulled back severely. She wears a full skirt and crinoline, covered by a long black cloak and dark bonnet—the Quaker forefathers having deemed this quite enough excitement to attract a male. Richard was drawn to her “bright and vivacious” manner. In preparation for bringing home a wife, he had purchased a house on Wheeley’s Road, about two miles from the factory. Spare moments were spent preparing the garden, transferring cuttings of his favorite plants from the rockery in his father’s garden. “My little home is beginning to look quite charming now it is nearly completed,” he told his youngest brother, Henry. There was just the furniture to buy before his wedding in July.

During the spring of 1861, the tone of the brothers’ discussion changed. As Quakers they were accustomed to finding answers in silent prayer. They had a duty to the workforce, and there were family obligations to consider. Since their mother died, their sister Maria had taken her place, caring for the younger members of the family. Now their father was in urgent need of help. They too must listen to the clear voice of conscience, mindful of a debt to man and God. They too must endeavour to do their best. Whatever their misgivings, they had no real choice. They made their decision. In April the two young brothers took over the running of the factory.

There was one last hope. They each had inherited £4,000 from their mother. Determined to save the family dream of a chocolate factory, they staked their inheritance down to the last penny. If they failed to turn the business around before the capital was gone, they would close the factory.

R
ichard and George soon found they were running down their inheritance fast just to keep afloat. The first year was worrying. By the end of 1861, Richard’s share of the loss was recorded at 226 pounds and George registered a similar figure. More capital from their inheritance would be needed. Richard, who had the added responsibilities of married life, imagined the next year’s losses. Perhaps they were not businessmen. Was this the beginning of a slow and inevitable decline to bankruptcy?

The brothers tried to calculate how long their capital would last. In the absence of any other source of funds, they had to make further cutbacks. Even basic pleasures such as drinking tea and reading the morning paper were now sacrificed. Each day started at six in the morning and did not end until late in the evening, with a supper of bread and butter eaten at the factory. “This stern martyrdom of the senses,” observed one of George’s colleagues years later, “drove all the energy of his nature into certain swift, deep channels,” creating an extraordinary “concentration of purpose.” Any small diversion or treat was dismissed as a “snare” that might “appeal to the senses” or absorb precious funds.

While George focused on purchasing, policy, and development, Richard tackled sales. The infrequent office visits by Dixon Hadaway, their Northern traveller, made a vivid impression on the staff. “It was a red letter day,” said one office worker. “It was real fun to listen to his
broad Scotch, as we could only understand a sentence here and there.” Hadaway loved his worn Scotch tweed coat, which he had worn since the Crimean War, “and I can still remember him extolling the beauties of the cloth and its wearing qualities.” Richard joined Hadaway and frequently took out the pony and trap to drum up business. He also hired additional full-time travellers. Samuel Gordon was to target Liverpool and Manchester. John Clark, recommended through a Quaker cousin, was hired to take on the whole of England south of Birmingham. Richard sent him first to London, but in a matter of weeks, Clark found business there so bad he begged to be transferred back to Birmingham. He feared he was wasting both his and the firm’s time. A letter survives from Richard, urging Clark not to give up on London and its suburbs:

To cover more ground, George also began to travel, and letters from Richard’s young wife show that his journeys away from home became more frequent. “We have come nearly to the end of another day and think of thee as that much nearer returning,” Elizabeth wrote to her husband in Glasgow a year after their marriage in July 1862. “We shall all be happy together if thou hast had a prosperous time.” In his enthusiasm to increase turnover, Richard himself would go into the warehouse to package the orders, “not only in the early days when hands were few, but even in his later years.”

During 1862, since both brothers were often away, they hired more office staff. One young worker who showed great promise was William Tallis. Orphaned as a child, he had had very little education but impressed everyone with his ability and enthusiasm. They
also employed their first clerk, George Truman, who recalls “working, as did Mr. George, till eight or nine every night, Saturdays included.” George Truman evidently also tried his hand at selling to the shops in Birmingham. A novice salesman, he generously offered samples for customers to try. The free chocolate goodies proved popular. He soon ran out and returned “in great distress” because “one customer had eaten half his samples!” He was reassured when “Mr. George said he could have as many samples as he wanted and he went out the next day quite happy.”

To address the problem of the product getting eaten before it left the factory, a system known as “Pledge Money” was put into effect. At the end of each day, a penny was awarded to any worker who successfully managed not to succumb to temptation. Every three months the pledge money was paid out, and one particularly abstemious employee remembers he accumulated so much that he was able to buy a pair of boots. Workers were also rewarded for punctuality. For those who arrived promptly at 6:00 AM, there was a breakfast of hot coffee or milk, bread, and buns.

Despite long sales trips away from home, the brothers soon found a lack of public enthusiasm for Iceland Moss, the product in which they had invested their early hopes. They continued to develop new lines of higher quality. They introduced a superior Breakfast Cocoa, as shown in their detailed sales brochure of 1862. This was followed a year later by Pearl Cocoa and then Chocolate du Mexique, a spiced vanilla-flavored cake chocolate. They improved existing brands such as Queen’s Own Chocolate, Crystal Palace Chocolate, Dietetic Cocoa, Trinidad Rock Cocoa, and Churchman’s Cocoa—a sustaining beverage for the sick. “So numerous are the sorts,” reported the
Grocer
magazine, “the purchaser is much puzzled in his choice.” So puzzled in fact that nothing seemed to excite the palate of Birmingham’s growing population.

Richard was keen to find new ways to promote the company’s range of nutritious beverages. Apart from notifying the trade through the
Grocer
, in 1862 he designed a stall to exhibit their products at the permanent exhibition in the Crystal Palace at Sydenham in South London. The brothers also paid for a stall exhibiting their
wares in the Manchester Corn Exchange. But these efforts were not enough. An elusive, appetizing “something” was missing from their products, deepening their worries and underscoring the risky nature of exploiting the delicious cocoa bean. The travellers returned with disappointing orders, putting the struggling cocoa business in still further jeopardy.

In battling to save the Bridge Street factory, there was one issue that the brothers had failed to tackle. However inventive their new recipes, and however adventurous the palate of the English public, by turning cocoa beans into a drink, they were faithfully following centuries of tradition. Despite its long and colorful history of cultivation, by the mid-nineteenth century the dark cocoa bean was mostly consumed in liquid form, largely unprocessed and unrefined. The Cadbury brothers were still thinking along lines rooted in ancient history.

Like many Victorians, Richard Cadbury had a passion for foreign culture and history. With his life circumscribed by long hours of labor in provincial English towns, he longed to travel beyond Europe and had been brought up on vivid tales of the foreign lands where cocoa originated and the exotic history of its cultivation. “It was one of the dreams of our childhood,” he wrote, “to sail on the bosom of that mighty river whose watershed drains the greater part of the northern portion of the continent of South America, and to explore the secrets of its thousand tributaries that penetrate forests untrodden by the foot of man.” He was particularly interested in the long and colorful history of cocoa in South America and Mexico, a history that gave intriguing glimpses as to how it might best be cultivated and consumed.