Nestle (Rowntrees) - York - August 2012

[sammydoublewhammy]

Visited with Clough And Boba Low

After having a look at another place in York and deciding it was a no go I got on the blower to Boba Low to see if anything was worth a pop, We decided to take a look at nestle which we were 90% sure was going to be not worth the hassle but to our surprise it was a goer.


Rowntree's was founded in York in 1862 by Henry Isaac Rowntree, who bought a chocolate company from the Tuke family. In 1869, he was joined by his brother, the philanthropist Joseph Rowntree. The original factory was in the centre of the City of York, by the River Ouse at Tanners Moat, but was relocated in 1906 to Haxby Road in the north of the City.
The Company merged with Mackintosh's in 1969, to become Rowntree Mackintosh. Rowntree was responsible for such chocolate favourites as Kit Kat, Smarties, Aero, Fruit Pastilles and Black Magic, while John Mackintosh and Co. produced Rolo, Munchies, Caramac and Quality Street. The same year,Hershey entered a licensing agreement with Rowntree Mackintosh to introduce Kit Kat and Rolo in the United States.
The company went public in 1987, and was the subject of a takeover battle between Nestlé and Jacobs Suchard in 1988. Nestlé eventually won control with an offer valuing Rowntree at $4.5billion. The takeover was controversial, as Nestlé was effectively protected from similar takeover attempts under Swiss law. After the Nestlé takeover, the Rowntree chocolate ranges began to use the branding "Nestlé Rowntree", before eventually the Rowntree name was dropped from the packaging altogether, except on Rowntree's Cocoa and the famous "Fruit Pastilles" and "Fruit Gums". The "Mackintosh" branding was dropped from all former Rowntree Mackintosh products, except for Mackintosh's Toffee, which retained the branding.
The Nestlé Rowntree factory in Norwich closed in 1994, and Rolo, Yorkie and Easter-egg production was moved to York.
In September 2006, it was announced that the manufacture of Smarties was to be moved abroad, causing 646 job-losses at the York factory


I've wanted to do this place since the day it closed but at the time I was living in Birmingham and I unfortunately didn't get to do it when it was probably at its prime but oh well. This place has a special thing to me for a few reasons one being that I actually had a tour of this place when I was about 9 because my grandma worked there at the time. And come to think of it my Grandma, Grandad, Mum, Dad, Step Dad, Great Aunties loads of my family worked here at some point and I always wanted to as a kid (back then I probably though working in a chocolate factory involved less work and more eating it) but anyway I'm starting to waffle so here it is the other chocolate factory that earned York the nickname of the "chocolate city" although I've only found this out now through wikipedia and never heard after 17 years or so of living in York.

[mr beardy]

Looks nice in there, nice pics SDW

[MJS]

Aye, nice shots mate. Good show sir

[birdinanaviary]

Proper bob on those are Sam-u-well
Love the first 3

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