{{short description|Bakery}} {{use British English |date=June 2022}} {{use dmy dates |date=June 2022}} <!-- Please do not remove or change this AfD message until the discussion has been closed. --> <!-- Once discussion is closed, please place on talk page: {{Old AfD multi|page=Crawford's Biscuits|date=24 June 2022|result='''keep'''}} --> <!-- End of AfD message, feel free to edit beyond this point --> [[File:King George IV lands at The Shore, Leith.png|thumb|right|The original bakery on The Shore is the third building from the left in this print, showing a visit by King George IV in 1822.{{r|ILN}}]] '''Crawford's''' is a brand of biscuits.
It started as a Scottish baker of ship's biscuits in a public house on The Shore, Leith in 1813. The bakery was acquired by Robert Mathie in 1817 and then William Crawford in 1856, when Mathie retired. '''William Crawford & Sons''' established large factories in Leith and Liverpool so that, at its peak, it was one of Britain's largest biscuit manufacturers and claimed to be its oldest. The company was acquired by United Biscuits in 1960 and is now a brand within their portfolio.
==History== In 1856, William Crawford (1818–1889) bought an established bakery at 31 The Shore, Leith from Robert Mathie (1789–1863). The bakery specialised in ships' biscuits and had been established in 1813,<ref name="Molyneux 2021"/><ref name="Grace's Guide">{{cite web |title=Crawford's Biscuits |url=https://www.gracesguide.co.uk/Crawford%27s_Biscuits |publisher=Grace's Guide |access-date=24 June 2022}}</ref> with Mathie taking it over in 1817.<ref name="letslookagain">{{cite web |url=http://letslookagain.com/tag/crawfords-biscuits-history/ |title=Crawfords biscuits history |website=Let's Look Again |access-date=2022-03-28}}</ref>
Crawford wished to expand the business and set up a retail outlet at 14 Leith Street (which links Leith Walk to Princes Street) in 1861, relocating to the exclusive address of 2 Princes Street in 1866. In 1879 they built a large purpose built factory on Elbe Street in Leith.<ref>Edinburgh Post Officer Directories 1866, 1879</ref> The Elbe Street factory was served by its own railway siding. A second factory premises was built in Leith on Anderson Place in 1947 (it is now in use as a creative hub).<ref name="Canmore">{{Cite web |title=Edinburgh, Anderson Place, Crawford's Biscuit Factory: Canmore |url=https://canmore.org.uk/site/203788/edinburgh-anderson-place-crawfords-biscuit-factory |access-date=2022-06-24 |website=canmore.org.uk }}</ref><ref name="Nast">{{cite web|url=https://www.cntraveller.com/gallery/things-to-do-in-leith| title=10 things to do in Leith | date=16 April 2022 |publisher=Condé Nast |access-date=25 June 2022}}</ref>
William's eldest son, William Crawford (1858–1926), became a partner of the business in 1880 and expanded it further. It was then known as Crawford and Sons.{{Citation needed|date=June 2022}}
In 1897, two younger brothers, Archibald Inglis Crawford and James Shields Russel Crawford, were sent to establish a subsidiary in Australia. They got as far as the major English port of Liverpool in England where they established a major new factory.<ref name=AZ>{{citation |page=32 |title=Crawford's Biscuits |work=A-Z of Leith Places-People-History |author=Lisa Sibbald |year=2018 |isbn=9781445682068 |publisher=Amberley Publishing}}</ref> This huge factory, the Fairfield Works, stands on Binns Road and was designed by their brother, the architect Alexander Hunter Crawford in 1895, taking two years to build.<ref name="DSA">{{cite web |title=Basic Biographical Details: Alexander Hunter Crawford |publisher=Dictionary of Scottish Architects |url=http://www.scottisharchitects.org.uk/architect_full.php?id=200056 |access-date=24 June 2022}}</ref> The Liverpool factory was highly mechanised, allowing creation of more elaborate biscuit designs, in particular the Custard cream which promptly became one of Britain's most popular biscuits.<ref>Daily Mail (newspaper), 7 April 2020</ref> The Fairfield factory made snack bars including Bandits, Penguin, and 54321 chocolate.<ref name="Molyneux 2021">{{cite news |last1=Molyneux |first1=Jess |title=Former Liverpool biscuit factory where workers "made friends for life" |url=https://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/news/nostalgia/former-liverpool-biscuit-factory-workers-21411444 |access-date=24 June 2022 |work=Liverpool Echo |date=9 September 2021}}</ref>
[[File:Crawford's war map no 2 presented by the proprietors of Crawford's Biscuits (5003845).jpg|thumb|right|In the First World War Crawford's produced presentation maps for consumers of their biscuits. This map is from the National Library of Wales.]]
In 1927 Crawfords were one of the first factories to provide employees with their own social club and sports facilities: at Sandown Hall in nearby Wavertree.<ref name="liverpoolpicturebook">{{cite web |url=https://www.liverpoolpicturebook.com/2013/03/william-crawford-sons.html |website=liverpoolpicturebook.com |title=Liverpool Picturebook |access-date=2022-03-28}}</ref>
In 1938, Crawford's carried out the first ever British national biscuit survey, interviewing approximately 5,000 households.<ref name="Collingham">{{cite book |last=Collingham |first=Lizzie |author-link=Lizzie Collingham |date=2020 |title=The Biscuit.The History of a Very British Indulgence |publisher=Random House |isbn=9781473573468}}</ref>
United Biscuits, formed in 1948 from two Scottish companies, MacFarlane Lang and McVitie & Price,<ref>{{cite web |last1=Wilson |first1=Nick |last2=Wright |first2=Mike |last3=Scholes |first3=Louise |title=Private Equity Portfolio Company Performance Through The Recession |url=https://www.bvca.co.uk/Portals/0/library/Files/News/2011/2011_0024_pe_company_performance_recession.pdf |publisher=BVCA |access-date=24 June 2022 |page=14 |date=17 March 2011 |quote=United Biscuits, the UK's largest biscuit group, resulted from the merger of two Scottish family businesses, McVitie & Price and MacFarlane Lang, in 1948. In 1960 the business added Crawford's Biscuits and MacDonald's Biscuits.}}</ref> acquired William Crawford & Sons in 1960<!--1962 appears to be a mistake--> for £6 million.<ref>"United Biscuits Crawfords For More Than £6M." ''The Times'' [London, England] 24 May 1962: 19.</ref><ref name="Behm 2005">{{cite journal |last1=Behm |first1=Michael |title=McVitie & Price, Ltd. United Biscuits Ltd. |journal=Commercial Overprint Society of Great Britain |date=1 March 2005 |volume=2 |issue=9 |quote=In 1960, United Biscuits added to its portfolio with the acquisition of Crawford's Biscuits and MacDonald's Biscuits.}}</ref>
Production processes were automated in the 1960s<!-- under United Biscuit ownership-->.<ref>{{cite web |title=Full record for "BULK HANDLING" (5842) - Moving Image Archive catalogue |url=https://movingimage.nls.uk/film/5842 |access-date=2022-06-24 |website=movingimage.nls.uk}}</ref>
The Elbe Street factory was expanded and modernised in the 1950s but demolished in the 1990s when housing in Leith's former industrial areas started to change the area. Around 200 people lost their jobs.{{Citation needed|date=June 2022}} The closure in 1996 was cited as a casualty in the Scottish "bread wars".<ref>{{cite news |title=Crawfords the bakers closes its doors after nearly a century as a Scottish institution Supermarket bread wars claim biggest casualty |date=4 September 1996 |url=https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/12034393.crawfords-the-bakers-closes-its-doors-after-nearly-a-century-as-a-scottish-institution-supermarket-bread-wars-claim-biggest-casualty/ |access-date=24 June 2022 |work=The Herald}}</ref>
McVities have struggled to maintain the Scottish factories for their iconic Scottish brands.<ref>{{Cite news |date=2021-05-11 |title=Glasgow biscuit factory closure plan puts nearly 500 jobs at risk |work=BBC News |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-57077865 |access-date=2022-06-24}}</ref>
==Products== thumb|Crawford's Biscuits - Press for Ice Cream Wafers thumb|upright=1.1|A Crawford's custard cream biscuit In 1923, the company advertised several biscuit varieties which commemorated royalty and its marriages:{{r|ILN}}
* York – the marriage of the Duke of York to Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon * Wedding Bells – the marriage of Princess Mary to Viscount Lascelles * Marie – the marriage of Grand Duchess Maria Alexandrovna of Russia to the Duke of Edinburgh * Royal George
Their range then included a variety of popular biscuits including shortbread, cream crackers, digestives and ginger nuts.
The brand now includes:
* Bourbon creams * Cream crackers * Custard creams * Digestives * Garibaldi biscuits<ref>{{citation |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eWOVY9OoP98 |work=Adam Richman's Biscuit Reviews |number=S2E2 |title=Crawford's Garibaldi Biscuits |author=Adam Richman |year=2021}}</ref> * Marie biscuits * "Nice" biscuits
==Packaging== Historically, some of Crawford's biscuits were sold in decorative biscuit tins.<ref name="HomesAntiques">{{cite web|url=https://www.homesandantiques.com/antiques/collecting-guides-antiques/collecting-biscuit-tins/ | title=Collecting biscuit tins |publisher=Homes and Antiques |access-date=25 June 2022}}</ref> In 2007, a Crawford biscuit tin was sold for £15,600 at Bonhams in the form of a sports car and was reported to be the most expensive tin sold until that date.<ref name="HomesAntiques"/>
==References== <references>
<ref name=ILN>{{citation |newspaper=The Illustrated London News |date=28 April 1923 |page=727 |title=Crawford's – The Oldest of the Biscuit Manufacturers}}</ref>
</references>
==External links== * [https://www.brightontoymuseum.co.uk/index/Category:Crawfords_Biscuits Crawfords Biscuits] at Brighton Toy Museum, with images of biscuit tins, model Crawford's Biscuits railway wagons, etc.
{{United Biscuits}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Crawfords biscuits}} Category:Biscuits Category:Scottish business families Category:Scottish brands