Chocolate wars : from Cadbury to Kraft - 200 years of sweet success and bitter rivalry

The delicious true story of the world's most famous chocolate firms by award-winning writer and a descendant of the Cadbury chocolate dynasty, Deborah Cadbury In 'Chocolate Wars' bestselling historian and award-winning documentary maker Deborah Cadbury takes a journey into her own family history to uncover the rivalries that have driven 250 years of chocolate empire-building. In the early nineteenth century Richard Tapper Cadbury sent his son, John, to London to study a new and exotic commodity: cocoa. Within a generation, John's sons, Richard and George, had created a chocolate company to rival the great English firms of Fry and Rowntree, and their European competitors Lindt and Nestle. The major English firms were all Quaker family enterprises, and their business aims were infused with religious idealism. In America, Milton Hershey and Forrest Mars proved that they had the appetite for business on a huge scale, and successfully resisted the English companies' attempts to master the American market. As chocolate companies raced to compete around the globe, Quaker capitalism met a challenge that would eventually defeat it. At the turn of the millennium Cadbury, the sole independent survivor of England's chocolate dynasties, became the world's largest confectionary company. But before long it too faced a threat to its very survival, and the chocolate wars culminated in a multi-billion pound showdown pitting independence and Quaker tradition against the cut-throat tactics of a corporate leviathan. Featuring a colourful cast of savvy entrepreneurs, brilliant eccentrics and resourceful visionaries, 'Chocolate Wars' is the story of a uniquely alluring product and of the evolution, for better and worse, of modern business. "With a cast of characters that wouldn't be out of place in a Victorian novel, Chocolate Wars tells the story of the great chocolatier dynasties, through the prism of the Cadburys. Chocolate was consumed unrefined and unprocessed as a rather bitter, fatty drink for the wealthy elite until the late 19th century, when the Swiss discovered a way to blend it with milk and unleashed a product that would conquer every market in the world. Thereafter, one of the great global business rivalries unfolded as each chocolate maker attempted to dominate its domestic market and innovate new recipes for chocolate that would set it apart from its rivals. The contest was full of dramatic contradictions: The Cadburys were austere Quakers who found themselves making millions from an indulgent product; Kitty Hershey could hardly have been more flamboyant yet her husband was moved by the Cadburys' tradition of philanthropy. Each was a product of their unique time and place yet they shared one thing: they want to make the best chocolate in the world"--Provided by publisher In the early nineteenth century the major English chocolate firms -- Fry, Rowntree, and Cadbury -- were all Quaker family enterprises that aimed to do well by doing good. The English chocolatiers introduced the world's first chocolate bar and ever fancier chocolate temptations -- while also writing groundbreaking papers on poverty, publishing authoritative studies of the Bible, and campaigning against human rights abuses. Chocolate was always a global business, and in the global competitors, especially the Swiss and the Americans Hershey and Mars, the Quaker capitalists met their match. The ensuing chocolate wars would culminate in a multi-billion-dollar showdown pitting Quaker tradition against the cutthroat tactics of a corporate behemoth. Featuring a cast of savvy entrepreneurs, brilliant eccentrics, and resourceful visionaries, Chocolate Wars is a delicious history of the fierce, 150-year business rivalry for one of the world's most coveted markets. In the early nineteenth century Richard Cadbury sent his son, John, to London to study a new and exotic commodity: cocoa. Within a generation, John's sons had created a chocolate company to rival the great English firms of Rowntree and Fry. All three firms were Quaker family enterprises, and their business aims were infused with religious idealism. As chocolate companies raced to compete around the globe, Quaker capitalism met a challenge that would eventually defeat it. At the turn of the millennium Cadbury, the sole survivor of England's chocolate dynasties, was the world's largest confectionery company. But before long the chocolate wars culminated in a multi-billion pound showdown pitting independence and Quaker tradition against the cut-throat tactics of a corporate leviathan. Nation of shopkeepers Food of the gods Wretched little victims of the workhouses They did not show us any mercy Absolutely pure and therefore the best Chocolate that melts in the mouth Machinery creates wealth but destroys men Money seems to disappear like magic Chocolate empires The chocolate giants Great wealth is not to be desired A serpentine and malevolent cocoa magnate The chocolate man's utopia That monstrous trade in flesh and blood God could have created us sinless This company isn't big enough for both of us I pray for snickers American tanks were on the lawn The quaker voice could still be heard. The delicious history of rival chocolate companies and their fascinating dynasties#x97;the Lindts, Frys, Hersheys, Mars, and Nestlés#x97; told by a descendant of the Cadbury family The true story of the early chocolate pioneers by the award-winning writer, and direct descendant of the famous chocolate dynasty, Deborah Cadbury.