The Manchester Plant is a large food factory in
North West England
North West England is one of nine official regions of England and consists of the ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial counties of Cheshire, Cumbria, Greater Manchester, Lancashire and Merseyside. The North West had a population of 7,4 ...
; during
World War II
World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
, it was the largest food factory in Europe. It is devoted to manufacturing
Kellogg's
Kellanova, formerly known as the Kellogg Company and commonly known as Kellogg's, is an American Multinational corporation, multinational food manufacturing company headquartered in Chicago, Illinois, US. Kellanova produces and markets con ...
cereal and related products.
History
American
Will Keith Kellogg
Will Keith Kellogg (born William Keith Kellogg; April 7, 1860 – October 6, 1951) was an American industrialist in food manufacturing, who founded the Kellogg Company, which produces a wide variety of popular breakfast cereals. He was a membe ...
(who died in October 1951) was part of the
Seventh-day Adventist Church
The Seventh-day Adventist Church (SDA) is an Adventist Protestant Christian denomination which is distinguished by its observance of Saturday, the seventh day of the week in the Christian (Gregorian) and the Hebrew calendar, as the Sa ...
, and a strict vegetarian. Other famous food industry families have had noted strong links to a sect of the Christian church.
In 1935,
All-Bran
All-Bran is a high-bran, high-fibre, wheat bran breakfast cereal manufactured by WK Kellogg Co for the North American market and Kellanova for the rest of the world. It is marketed as an aid to digestive health.
History
The introduction of All-B ...
was imported from Canada.
During the Second World War, the site's production was only sold to the North, Scotland and the Midlands.
The factory was damaged by high winds at the end of February 1949. It suffered a gas explosion in a basement on Saturday 15 July 1950.
The production manager, Joseph Askew, died suddenly at home, on Poplar Road in Stretford, on 3 February 1956, aged 58.
During food rationing, the parent US company would fly in parcels of food, for all the staff, in the week before Christmas, on an aircraft from Dublin, with a turkey and Christmas pudding for each employee. After rationing stopped, the company continued the tradition, for some years. By 1960, the site was making 1.25 million boxes per day.
The other £14m production site in
north Wales
North Wales ( ) is a Regions of Wales, region of Wales, encompassing its northernmost areas. It borders mid Wales to the south, England to the east, and the Irish Sea to the north and west. The area is highly mountainous and rural, with Snowdon ...
opened on 28 April 1978; construction had started in July 1976.
Around three hundred workers were made redundant in 1981, due to automation and a £5.5m investment.
Construction
The site was essentially chosen due to the proximity to the
Manchester Ship Canal
The Manchester Ship Canal is a inland waterway in the North West England, North West of England linking Manchester to the Irish Sea. Starting at the River Mersey, Mersey Estuary at Eastham, Merseyside, Eastham, near Ellesmere Port, Cheshire, it ...
, built by The Kellogg Company of Great Britain; the site in Manchester was chosen by Harry McEvoy (c.1902 - 3 November 1984), the managing director. It was the largest food manufacturing factory in Europe. It was built in ten months.
On Thursday 17 June 1937 construction started, the first factory on the new Barton Dock Estate, owned by the Manchester Ship Canal Company. It would cost £250,000. The granary could store 500,000 tons of grain, with eight grain stores, 130 ft high, 30 ft wide, and built in only nine days. All of the raw materials came from the
British Empire
The British Empire comprised the dominions, Crown colony, colonies, protectorates, League of Nations mandate, mandates, and other Dependent territory, territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It bega ...
, with the white corn for Corn Flakes grown in South Africa. The factory was expected to open at the end of February 1938.
The £500,000 five floor site opened on 24 May 1938, which was
Empire Day
Commonwealth Day is the annual celebration of the Commonwealth of Nations, held on the second Monday in March. While the date holds some official status in select Member states of the Commonwealth of Nations, member states of the Commonwealth ...
, the birthday of
Queen Victoria
Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until Death and state funeral of Queen Victoria, her death in January 1901. Her reign of 63 year ...
. It was opened by a woman from north
Nottinghamshire
Nottinghamshire (; abbreviated ''Notts.'') is a ceremonial county in the East Midlands of England. The county is bordered by South Yorkshire to the north-west, Lincolnshire to the east, Leicestershire to the south, and Derbyshire to the west. Th ...
, from 22 Second Avenue,
Edwinstowe
Edwinstowe is a village and civil parish in the Newark and Sherwood district of Nottinghamshire, England, on the edge of Sherwood Forest and the Dukeries. It is associated with the legends of Robin Hood and Maid Marian, and to a lesser extent ...
; her husband worked at the nearby
Thoresby Colliery
Thoresby Colliery was a coal mine in north Nottinghamshire on the outskirts of Edwinstowe village. The mine, which opened in 1925, was the last working colliery in Nottinghamshire when it closed in 2015. The site has been cleared and is being r ...
. The factory was the largest cereal factory in the
British Empire
The British Empire comprised the dominions, Crown colony, colonies, protectorates, League of Nations mandate, mandates, and other Dependent territory, territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It bega ...
, covering seven acres. She had six children, and had been chosen in April 1938 from around five thousand applicants on Wednesday 27 April 1938.
McEvoy would be chairman of the Cereal Foods Manufacturing Association from the start until 1967.
The huge illuminated ''K'' sign, was switched on on 24 November 1981, being 60 ft long. A new UK headquarters was built in the late 1980s next to
Old Trafford Cricket Ground
Old Trafford is a cricket ground in Old Trafford, Greater Manchester, England. It opened in 1857 as the home of Manchester Cricket Club and has been the home of Lancashire County Cricket Club since 1864. From 2013 onwards it has been known ...
on Talbot Road, with 400 staff, costing £2m.
By the late 1980s, the factory was seven times larger, and the second-largest breakfast cereal factory in the world.
Visits
Prince Philip visited on Friday 14 June 1963, where he met the same Nottinghamshire woman, now aged 70, who had opened the site in May 1938; she now lived in
Breaston
Breaston ( ) is a large village and civil parish in the Borough of Erewash, Erewash district, in the south-east of Derbyshire and lies approximately east of the city of Derby and west of the city of Nottingham. The population of the civil paris ...
in south-east
Derbyshire
Derbyshire ( ) is a ceremonial county in the East Midlands of England. It borders Greater Manchester, West Yorkshire, and South Yorkshire to the north, Nottinghamshire to the east, Leicestershire to the south-east, Staffordshire to the south a ...
. The site was now 18 acres. He had visited Leigh Boys' Grammar School in the morning, and two other Manchester factories, leaving Liverpool Airport at 6.20pm.
On Wednesday 22 May 1974, the factory was visited by the Prince of Wales.
Margaret Thatcher, as Prime Minister, visited on the afternoon of Friday 15 January 1982. Mrs Thatcher had been warmly greeted earlier on the same day when she visited the
University of Salford
The University of Salford is a Public university, public research university in Salford, Greater Manchester, Salford, Greater Manchester, England, west of Manchester city centre. The Royal Technical Institute, Salford, which opened in 1896, be ...
, with around three hundred students carrying black flags, and a draped coffin. She had visited the area by plane at
Manchester Airport
Manchester Airport is an international airport in Ringway, Manchester, England, south-west of Manchester city centre. In 2024, it was the third busiest airport in the United Kingdom in terms of passengers (the busiest outside of London) ...
on a
Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the Air force, air and space force of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. It was formed towards the end of the World War I, First World War on 1 April 1918, on the merger of t ...
aircraft, arriving back in north-west London at 6.30pm.
On Sunday 5 January 2020,
Channel 5 showed ''Secrets of the Kellogg's Factory'', with food historian
Polly Russell
Polly Elisabeth Russell is a food historian and curator at the British Library with responsibility for research on social science and food. She writes a food history column for the FT Magazine, weekend magazine of the ''Financial Times'' and fro ...
.
BBC Two
BBC Two is a British free-to-air Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's second flagship channel, and it covers a wide range of subject matte ...
made an hour-long documentary on Tuesday 26 July 2016, looking at the production of
Crunchy Nut
Crunchy Nut (previously known as "Crunchy Nut Corn Flakes" in the UK, and "Nut & Honey Crunch"/"Honey & Nut Corn Flakes" in the US) is a breakfast cereal made by Kellogg's with flakes of corn, honey, three types of sugar, and chopped peanuts. Th ...
, interviewing Professor of Nutrition
Louise Dye and
food historian
Food history is an interdisciplinary field that examines the history and the cultural, economic, environmental, and sociological impacts of food and human nutrition. It is considered distinct from the more traditional field of culinary history, wh ...
Seren Evans-Charrington; the production of
Coco Pops
Cocoa Krispies (also known as Choco Krispis, Choco Krispies, Coco Pops, Choco Pops depending on region) is a breakfast cereal produced by WK Kellogg Co (formerly Kellogg's), coming both as a boxed cereal and as a snack bar with a 'dried milk' c ...
, made with
Arborio rice
Arborio rice is an Italian medium-grain rice. It is named after the ''comune'' (municipality) of Arborio, in the Po Valley, which is situated in the Piedmont region. When cooked, the rounded grains are firm, creamy and chewy compared to other v ...
; the addition of vitamin D with Professor of Immunology
Adrian Martineau and nutritionist
Angelique Panagos, and how from October to April in the UK there is not enough sunshine to make
vitamin D
Vitamin D is a group of structurally related, fat-soluble compounds responsible for increasing intestinal absorption of calcium, magnesium, and phosphate, along with numerous other biological functions. In humans, the most important compo ...
.
''
Food Unwrapped'', with
Kate Quilton
Katie Marie Quilton (born 30 November 1983 in Nuneaton, Warwickshire) is an English television presenter and journalist. She is best known for presenting a number of Channel 4 television series, including '' Food Unwrapped'' since 2012.
Early ...
of
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by Channel Four Television Corporation. It is state-owned enterprise, publicly owned but, unlike the BBC, it receives no public funding and is funded en ...
shown on Monday 7 September 2015 series 6 episode 2, visited the factory, to investigate how vitamins and
iron
Iron is a chemical element; it has symbol Fe () and atomic number 26. It is a metal that belongs to the first transition series and group 8 of the periodic table. It is, by mass, the most common element on Earth, forming much of Earth's o ...
were added to Cornflakes, where a nutritionist showed Kate that Cornflakes floating on water could be attracted by a magnet; the programme was made by
Ricochet
A ricochet ( ; ) is a rebound, bounce, or skip off a surface, particularly in the case of a projectile. Most ricochets are caused by accident and while the force of the deflection decelerates the projectile, it can still be energetic and almost ...
.
On Sunday 10 April 2022, Channel 4 showed an hour-long documentary about the factory, with Amalia Diamanti of Greece, of Kellogg's research and development, with series editor
Anushka Roberts, made by HLP Studios.
Incidents
On Thursday 11 August 1955, 28-year-old Harold Grupwell was caught in a revolving bran cooker, and killed.
On the night of Sunday 22 October 1967, the site had a large fire, with 150 firemen attending.
In May 1977, 1,400 factory workers went on strike.
On Sunday 9 September 1979, workers went back to work after a ten-week strike, after accepting a £8.50 a week pay rise.
Production
Corn arrives at the
Dacsa Group site at Liverpool docks, and takes around one hour and twenty minutes to get to the factory. 200 tonnes of corn arrives each day, from Argentina, processing around ten tonnes of Corn Flakes each hour.
150 tonnes of Arborio rice arrives each day from Italy and Spain.
It makes a million packets of cereal a day. It makes 21,000 tonnes of Coco Pops each year.
For Crunchy Nut, each day it requires 10 tonnes of nuts and 3 tonnes of honey.
Distribution
The distribution centre is guided by
automated guided vehicle
An automated guided vehicle (AGV), different from an autonomous mobile robot (AMR), is a portable robot that follows along marked long lines or wires on the floor, or uses radio waves, vision cameras, magnets, or lasers for navigation. They ar ...
s, made by
Dematic
Dematic is an American supplier of materials handling systems, software and services. With a growth rate of 21.2% in 2021 Dematic was listed as the world's second-largest materials handling systems supplier with a revenue of 3.2 billion USD. The ...
.
The site is alongside the north-south A5181, at the T-junction with the B5211. Its main warehouse is further to the west, along the B5211.
Energy production
In December 2005, a contract for a 5MW
cogeneration
Cogeneration or combined heat and power (CHP) is the use of a heat engine or power station to generate electricity and useful heat at the same time.
Cogeneration is a more efficient use of fuel or heat, because otherwise- wasted heat from elec ...
(CHP) unit on the site was awarded to Elyo Industrial Ltd (now called Industrial Energy Services Ltd).
See also
*
Worksop Factory
The Worksop Factory is a main food manufacturing site in Bassetlaw District in north Nottinghamshire that makes well-known types of List of instant foods, instant food, such as instant noodles, as well as well-known gravy products.
History
Unileve ...
References
External links
Prince Charles visits in May 1974
{{Commons category, Kellogg's plant, Trafford Park
1938 establishments in England
Buildings and structures in Trafford
Economy of Greater Manchester
Food manufacturers of England
Food manufacturing plants in the United Kingdom
Industrial buildings completed in 1938
Kellogg's
Stretford