Sweet way to earn a living
10:30am Tuesday 3rd March 2009 in News By Staff Reporter
some of the party watching a stage in the manufacture of chocolates
ABOUT 470 Bolton grocers and confectioners and their friends, and a Bolton Evening News reporter, visited the Bournville factory of Cadbury Bros Ltd, near Birmingham, in May 1951, to see the working and living conditions of the firm’s 9,000 employees.
They were surprised and delighted by what they saw.
There was no housing problem and a factory school looked after the education of workers’ children, while the workers, if they were ambitious or had a lust for learning, could profit by the school of arts and crafts, Ruskin Hall, or by the day continuation college, where almost every skilled trade was taught.
But most impressive were the conditions inside the factory. Many of the jobs in chocolate-making were unavoidably monotonous, but bright surroundings and background music did much to relieve the monotony.
Lancashire could take a few hints from this modern Midlands factory.
