Forty
thousand dozen Showboat cakes left the
Garrett's Green, Birmingham, factory every
week. It was their biggest-selling line.
They consisted of small chocolate-shells
which were filled with sponge cake, topped
with butter cream, then piped and
decorated by hand. The cakes were then
individually wrapped and packed in boxes
of six or twenty-four. Their recommended
retail price was 3/3d for the six pack, or
7d wrapped and packed into boxes as
individual pieces.
Mint
Meringues, Fondant Fancies, Macaroon,
Cakelets and Home Made Crackle Cakes were
just a few of the other popular lines the
company made under the Fuller or Kunzle
brands. Own-label cake for Marks &
Spencer, British Home Stores and Tesco
were also made at the Garrett's Green
factory.
The firm
of C. Kunzle Ltd was started in the early
twenties by Christian Kunzle, a Swiss
chef, who worked for a time at the House
of Commons, Westminster. He opened a
number of restaurants in and around
Birmingham and the factory was established
to supply cakes and pastry to these
restaurants and later, to agencies. The
firm was carried on by his son Ernest and
grandson George, and became regional then
national. The restaurants were sold but
the factory continued to expand. it moved
to Garrett's Green in 1960 and by 1970
employed seven hundred people. In 1964
Kunzle was taken over by Fullers; in June
1968 Fuller/Kunzle was acquired by
Scribbans-Kemp, and in November 1968 all
the bakery interests of Scribbans-Kemp
were bought by Lyons.
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