Chocolates are too common an eatable to need any special introduction. They are colourful, crunchy, munchy & yummy too !!, and affordable with some extra calories sprinkled in. They come in a variety of sizes, packages and colours, which appeal to everyone, Grandpa/mas & Kindergarten chubbies, all alike. Hence, with the kind of mass appeal they project, it’s no surprise that a company like Cadburys springs up the choicest of flavours & tastes every now & then.
Cadburys came into being in 1824, thanks to the efforts initiated by John Cadbury, in Bridge Street, Birmingham, UK. The Cadburys were a family inclined towards the non conformist Quaker Movement of the 18th century. By the 1870s the Cadbury business in the Bridge street factory had a strong workforce of 200 & the Cadburys were on the lookout for a new site. On June 1878 the ideal site was found - the Bournbrook Estate, fourteen and a half acres of land between the villages of Stirchley and King’s Norton, about four miles south of the centre of Birmingham. It was later christened ’’BournVille’’.
Milk chocolate for eating was first made by Cadbury in 1897 by adding milk powder paste to the dark chocolate recipe of cocoa mass, cocoa butter and sugar.By today’s standards this chocolate was not particularly good as it was very coarse and dry and was not sweet or milky enough for public tastes.
At that time there was a great deal of competition in the UK from continental manufacturers, not only the French with their fancy chocolates but also from the Swiss, who were renowned for their milk chocolate.
Led by George Cadbury Junior, the Bournville experts set out to meet the challenge.A considerable amount of time and money was spent on research and new plant designed to produce the new chocolate in much larger quantities. A new recipe was formulated incorporating fresh milk and new production processes were developed to produce a milk chocolate - ’not merely as good as but better than’ the imported milk chocolate.
Four years of hard work were invested in the project and in 1905 what was to be Cadbury’s top selling brand was launched. Three names were considered Jersey, Highland Milk and Dairy Maid. Dairy Maid became Dairy Milk and Cadbury’s Dairy Milk with its unique flavour and smooth creamy texture was ready to challenge the Swiss domination of the milk chocolate market.
By 1913 it had become the company’s best selling line and in the mid twenties Cadbury’s Dairy Milk gained its status as the brand leader, a position that it has held ever since. Today more than 250 million bars of Cadbury’s Dairy Milk are made every year and sales reach over £100 million in value.
While advertising and label design have changed with fashions and considerable strides have been made in manufacturing techniques, the recipe for Cadbury’s Dairy Milk with its ’glass and a half of full cream milk in every half pound produced’ , is still basically the same as when it was launched.
In a country like India, where the taste of the urbanites rules the roost with that of the idyllic countryside given the backburner, the chocolate industry rakes in much profit especially in the metros. The choco-giants spend millions of dollars to spruce up snazzy ads to match the wish-list of the X-generation, but few manage to REALLY LIVE UP TO THE STANDARDS when it comes to QUALITY.Amidst all these hulla-balloo, comes the CRACKER of a delight, the CADBURYS DAIRY MILK.
I still remember the day when we got our 1st TV set (B&W), I was 6 yrs old then, way back in 1985. Opening the DOOR for DOORdarshan used to be very exciting, I would watch all the ads with utmost passion, although these days I don’t have even .001% of the interest to catch a glimpse on what is fared out. They used to telecast a very simple yet eye-catching ad of a kid beaming with pride & happiness when handed a Cadburys Five star, for his outstanding (5*) performance in the class. I used to, at once, put myself into the shoes of the kid with a real Five star in my hand & enact the entire scene.
Things have changed over the years, but I still treasure the memories & enact the scene, with a DAIRY MILK in my hand. Cadburys has always been my favourite brand since my childhood. The Dairy milk variety as I had elaborated above is one of the best around as far as the feature & quality is concerned. The best part is that you wont have to drool over missed breakfasts/lunches when the DAIRY MILK is there to provide a delicious and hunger-free company.
A couple of years back, they used to telecast a jazzy ad featuring a girl cavorting to the hilt to celebrate the runs scored by her Batsman-Boyfriend, with the intermediate reels providing a snap of cocoa & milk cream swirling & metamorphosing into the real chocolate. I used to admire the graphics incorporated, but the USP of the ad lied in making the viewer believe that ’’A CadBURYS a day keeps the WORRIES away’’. It practically Buries One’s Worries
That’s pretty true, at least in my belief. My hectic schedule doesn’t allow me to stuff in a healthy Breakfast on a regular basis, hence I always keep a pair of CaDamees (that’s my version of the Cadburys Dairy Milk) ready with me...WAR TIME MEASURES I BELIEVE :-)) whenever I feel like swooping down on a heavy lunch but can’t get out of the Conference room, the CaDamees come to my rescue.Whenever I’m driving down the stench-filled bylanes of the Chennai Sub-urbs, the ethereal flavour of the CaDamees care for me... My neighbourhood kids wait till the wee hours, anticipating me with a big packet of Cadburys & ofcourse, they always get CaDamees.
Cadburys is one company which is concerned about the health & hygiene of the individuals who w’d be Reviewing it’s Products VORACIOUSLY at a later stage. Few w’d be knowing that it stands 1st in the list of the ISO 9001 Quality Inspectors for it’s impeccably flourished Manufacturing Plants in BournVille. The Pioneering effort of what started out as a One Man Business has manifested itself into generations of Conscious management, Savvy marketing & Healthy Employment .
And there goes the Lullaby ’’Houses made of chocolates & Windows painted in Cream...