It's been over 70 years since one Merseyside chocolate factory was at the heart of one town.
Back in 1952, Cadbury Bros Ltd began building a factory in Moreton, Wirral in the hopes of regenerating Merseyside after WWII. Two years later, the factory and its surroundings were completed and it was officially opened on September 17 by Mrs Lawrence Cadbury.
The much-loved factory, based on Pasture Road, saw workers across the decades create family favourites from Cadbury chocolates to biscuits, hot chocolate powder and more. The site was also said to have had its own library and social club with activities for workers to enjoy.
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The workforce, which included many members of the same families, and they later began making products from other brands when Cadbury merged with drinks company Schweppes in 1969, including Typhoo Tea. In 1986, the factory was taken over by Burton's, which refined chocolate for Cadbury's on site, as well as manufacturing its own brands such as favourites Wagon Wheels and Jammie Dodgers.
Jean Anderson, formerly Tierney, had lived in Moreton her whole life when she began working on the site in her late teens. As part of the Liverpool ECHO's How It Used To Be series, we spoke to Jean about life in the lost Cadbury's factory and how the area changed around it.
Jean, 80, told the ECHO: "My first job before I went to Cadburys was a shop assistant for the Co Op. You had to be 18 to start at Cadburys.
"Living in Moreton, I watched that being built from laying the first brick, I didn't know at the time it was going to be a biscuit factory. My dad also worked there building it, so I applied for a job.
"I went for an interview, you had to have a medical before you started anyway and I got the job in 1960." Jean first trained on packing Milk Trays before being trained in other departments and said she was allowed to occasionally eat some of the chocolate that was not to be taken out.
Jean said: "I was a straightener as biscuits came out of cooler, I was a gripper packer putting biscuits into boxes, I was a weigher weighing biscuits that then went to be wrapped and boxed to go out to the shops. I think everybody from Moreton worked in Cadburys - everybody knew everybody.
"It was a lovely atmosphere, it was a pleasure working there. You never had the chance to get bored."
Jean worked at the factory for three years until she left when she got married and went to live in Liverpool. After a five year break, Jean returned to the factory for evening shifts between having her children.
Jean said: "Our highlight of the week was going to the Cadbury's club were most of us met on a Friday night. I can even remember Miss Ashcroft was senior forewoman, Betty Jones was forewoman and Margaret Morris was our chargehand as they were called those days.
"Friday afternoon we could go to the choc shop to buy our broken biscuits and chocolates." Jean said when she was getting married, she was presented with a "beautiful bible" which she still has 60 years on, as well as a collection and other gifts.
Do you remember Cadburys in Moreton? Let us know in the comments section below.
Jean said: "I loved the place to work. I never got the chance to work in the cake department or Typhoo Tea, but they were the good old days, they were happy days and I have lots of happy memories. The days during summer when it was too hot to work we would be sent home early because the chocolate wouldn't set.
"It was sad to see it being pulled down after all those years and turned into a housing estate, were now two of my great-grandchildren live. It was the heart of Moreton."
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Around 2011, the doors of the Cadburys factory as we knew it closed. The site was later acquired by Belgian chocolate firm Barry Callebaut in 2018.
Demolition of the Cadbury factory began in 2019, and in March 2022, Barry Callebaut announced it had started a consultation process on the potential closure of its factory on the Moreton site.
In May 2022, the ECHO reported how Barry Callebaut had confirmed the site would cease operations owing to a significant decrease in volume at Moreton, along with a growing number of operational restrictions. The closure would result in the loss of 62 jobs, with the plant having employed 45 permanent employees and 19 agency workers.
Cadbury still has a factory in Bournville, Birmingham, which is where every new Cadbury's chocolate product starts life. But many still hold fond memories of life at Moreton's Cadburys factory.
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