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In 1824, John Cadbury opened a narrow brick storefront on Bull Street in Birmingham.
In the back of his store, he measured loose tea leaves into paper packets, ground coffee beans, and stirred hot chocolate in copper pots.
As his Quaker as his guide—he stamped exact weights on packages, displayed clear prices on slate boards, and refused to water down his drinking chocolate as other merchants did.
When local children came in with pennies, he filled their cups to the brim.
His careful attention to each customer and insistence on pure ingredients drew a steady stream of regulars.
That small shop grew into the modern candy behemoth known as Cadbury.
In 1847, John and Benjamin Cadbury pooled £4,000 of their savings to rent a four-story factory on Bridge Street in Birmingham.
They installed steam-powered cocoa grinders and began producing drinking chocolate from raw cocoa beans.
John managed production, perfecting their chocolate-making process, while Benjamin traveled throughout England securing wholesale contracts with grocers.
Within their first year, they doubled their weekly output from 100 to 200 pounds of processed cocoa.
The partnership worked because of the brothers' complementary skills:
Queen Victoria awarded Cadbury a Royal Warrant in 1854, allowing the company to print "Cocoa and Chocolate Makers to the Queen" on their products and storefront.
The warrant meant Cadbury could display the royal coat of arms—a crowned shield with a lion and unicorn—on their chocolate bars, cocoa tins, and shop signs.
This royal endorsement helped Cadbury sell more chocolate across Britain.
Shops stocking Cadbury's chocolate prominently displayed the royal arms, distinguishing their offerings from competitors.
In 1866, Cadbury installed a Dutch-made hydraulic press in their Birmingham factory.
This machine squeezed excess cocoa butter from roasted beans, reducing the final product's fat content from 53% to 28%.
The mixture dissolved better in milk and carried a richer chocolate flavor, unlike the gritty, oily mixture customers had known before.
British consumers could now drink a smooth cup of cocoa without skimming off a layer of grease—a daily improvement that helped Cadbury outsell their rivals Fry's and Rowntree's.
In 1879, Cadbury built Bournville, a planned community of brick houses and gardens 4 miles south of Birmingham.
Workers lived in cottages with indoor plumbing, front and back gardens, and wide, tree-lined streets.
The village included a school, shops, recreation fields, and public gardens.
Each family had private space and fresh air.
By 1900, over 300 families lived in these homes, paying weekly rents of 5-7 shillings—about a quarter of what similar housing cost in Birmingham.
The village banned pubs and alcohol sales, because of the owner’s Quaker values.
In 1905, George Cadbury Jr. created the Dairy Milk chocolate bar by mixing more milk into chocolate than any manufacturer ever before.
The bar contained 2.5 glasses of milk in every half-pound of chocolate.
It had a smoother, creamier texture than the dark, often bitter chocolate bars on the markets.
While Swiss companies dominated milk chocolate production at the time, Cadbury became the first British company to successfully produce milk chocolate at scale, using fresh milk from local dairy farms.
By 1914, customers bought more Dairy Milk bars than any other Cadbury product.
In 1939, Cadbury retooled its Bournville chocolate production lines to manufacture military equipment.
During the war, workers operated lathes, crafting metal components for Spitfire seats and precision milling machines.
This shift from confectionery to military production enabled Cadbury to supply essential war materials while keeping its workforce employed throughout World War II.
Cadbury and Schweppes merged in 1969, combining their confectionery and beverage operations into a single corporation.
The merger paired Cadbury's chocolate manufacturing with Schweppes' soft drink production, extending both companies' market reach across Britain and overseas.
The united company split in 2008.
The confectionery business retained the Cadbury name, while the beverage division became the Dr Pepper Snapple Group, each operating as independent companies.
In 2010, Kraft Foods bought Cadbury for £11.5 billion.
Kraft Foods divided itself in 2012, creating two distinct companies: Kraft Foods Group managed North American grocery products, while Mondelēz International took control of global snack and confectionery brands.
This restructuring placed Cadbury under Mondelēz International's ownership, where it operates today.
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