Biscuit Lorry biscuit tin, Crumpsall Cream Crackers (Chad Valley)
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Biscuit Lorry biscuit tin, Crumpsall Cream Crackers (Chad Valley) (i)
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Arch Two , Area 9 Biscuit Tins (display) |
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Side detail with CWS brands [image info]
A green lithographed tinplate Crumpsall Cream Crackers Dennis lorry with working headlights, made as a promotional floor toy for the Cooperative Wholesale Society (CWS).
This exhibit is from the collection of Sarah Leather
Description
The lorry is predominantly green, with an open top, showing a single top layer of 4×8=32 cube-shaped biscuit tins with various CWS designs and colours, including Glider Biscuits, C.W.S. Cream Crackers, Prince of Wales Biscuits, Banana Cream Biscuits, C.W.S. Digestive Biscuits, Standard Assorted Biscuits, and C.W.S. Biscuits, Children's Rhymes.
The sides of the lorry have a broad gold-bordered horizontal cream band bearing the sinuously-flowing text: "CRUMPSALL CREAM CRACKERS", and the CWS roundel logo appears at the front and back, above and below the band.
The shallow enclosed driver's cab has a cream roof and an upturned lip at the front reading "C.W.S.". The lorry's engine bonnet is green with gold detailing fixed to a black base, and has a "DENNIS" marque above the radiator grille. The two headlight mountings are fitted to the base on each side of the radiator, and have removable spotlight-styled miniature lightbulbs, with the the hinged movable exterior handbrake on the left side of the cab probably being the switch.
The numberplate printed at the base of the windscreen and above the bonnet is NC 7107, there's a circled number "3" at a lower corner of the cab front, and the tinplate wheels have green hubs and white or pale grey printed tyres.
Promotional use
- " In the summer train loads of visitors came to the city. ... Upon leaving the factory it was custom to hand out free samples. One of the freebies has now become a sought after collectable.
- A biscuit tin in the form of a 1930s delivery van which contained cream crackers had working headlights. Printed around the top of the van was an image of all the biscuit types produced at the factory. ...
Manchester Evening News, 12 October 2007
Crumpsall Biscuits
The 1873 Crumpsall Works in Manchester was the CWS' first factory, and was created to be an ideal model factory for employees. The works consisted of the biscuit factory, a cake factory and "sweets and toffees", and "drugs and sundries" departments.
External links
- CWS Delivery Van Biscuit Tin, 1910 (britishbiscuittins.co.uk)
- Aah, biscuits! (manchestereveningnews.co.uk)
