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 their workforce, and there were family obligations to consider. Since their mother had 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 their debt to man and God. They too must endeavour to do their best. Whatever their misgivings, they had no real choice. In April the two young brothers took over the running of the factory.
There was one last hope. They had each 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.
Chapter 2
Food of the Gods
Richard and George soon found themselves 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, and George registered a similar figure. More capital from their inheritance would be needed. Richard, who had the added responsibilities of married life, could not help imagining 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 absorb precious funds.
While George focused on purchasing, policy and development, Richard tackled sales. The infrequent appearances of their traveller, Dixon Hadaway, in the office 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 old 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’.
Dixon Hadaway, the Cadbury brothers’ first traveller, whose territory extended from Rugby to northern Scotland.
Richard joined Hadaway on some of his travels, and frequently took out the pony and trap to drum up business. He also hired some additional full-time travellers. Samuel Gordon was to target Liverpool and Manchester, while John Clark, recommended by 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, as he feared he was wasting both his and the firm’s time. A letter survives from Richard, urging him not to give up on London and its suburbs:
We do particularly wish this well worked, as we believe it will ultimately repay both us and thyself to do so, and thou may depend if thou dost thoroughly work it, we will see nothing is lost to thee whether with or without success . . . It is important for us both to pull together for we have so much to do to conquer reserve and prejudice, and thou may be assured we will do our part in this in the way of improvements in style and quality of our goods.
To cover more ground, George too began to travel, taking on Wales, the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands. Letters from Richard’s young wife Elizabeth 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,’ she wrote to him in Glasgow in July 1862, a year after their marriage. ‘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. These proved so popular that he soon ran out, and returned to the factory ‘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 being eaten before it left the factory, a system known as ‘pledge money’ was put into effect. Each day a penny was awarded to any worker who had managed not to succumb to temptation. Every three months the pledge money was paid out: 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 a.m. there was a breakfast of hot coffee or milk, bread and buns.
Unaccountably, the brothers found there was a lack of public enthusiasm for Iceland Moss, in which they had invested their early hopes. They continued to develop new lines of higher quality, introducing a superior Breakfast Cocoa, as shown in their detailed sales brochure of 1862. This was followed a year later by Pearl Cocoa, then by Chocolat du Mexique, a spiced vanilla-flavoured 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 invalids. ‘So numerous are the sorts,’ reported the Grocer magazine of these different types of cocoa drink, ‘the purchaser is much puzzled in his choice.’ So puzzled in fact that no single one of Cadbury’s products seemed to excite the palate of the Midlands’ growing population.
Richard was keen to find new ways to promote their different types of nutritious beverage. 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 it was not enough. An elusive ‘something’ was missing from their products, preventing them from exploiting the clearly delicious cocoa bean. Their travellers returned with disappointing orders, putting the struggling business in 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 British public, by turning cocoa beans into a drink, they were faithfully following centuries of tradition. Despite its long and colourful history of cultivation, by the mid-nineteenth century the dark cocoa bean was mostly consumed in a liquid form, largely unprocessed and unrefined, as it always had been. The Cadbury brothers, like everyone else, were still thinking along lines rooted in ancient history.
Like many Victorians, Richard Cadbury had a passion for foreign culture and