|
The story of soft ice cream
in Britain started in the United States back in 1954 with
two Irish brothers, William and James Conway. They had the
idea to place a soft ice cream machine/freezer and an electricity
generating set into a Chevrolet panel truck, and for the
first time, took soft ice cream out of the shopping mall
and onto the streets. This new innovation became a huge
success and by 1956 it had grown into a fully formed brand
– Mister Softee was born. The new ice cream brand
was launched to the public in West Philadelphia on St Patrick's
Day 1956, and then later that year at The National Ice Cream
Convention in Atlantic City.
In 1957 the Managing Director
of Smith's Delivery Vehicles (supplier of ice cream vans
to Lyons) was on a sales trip to the United States and saw
the new Mister Softee mobile ice cream operation. He immediately
saw an opportunity to increase vehicle production at his
Gateshead factory. Negotiations took place between Smith’s
Delivery Vehicles and the Conway brothers with Smith’s
eventually securing the rights to the Mister Softee ice
cream brand in the United Kingdom. It is here that Lyons
enter the story, as Smith’s Delivery Vehicles desperately
needed a partner to bring the American brand to the British
market. The Board at Lyons listened to Smith's proposal
and decided to send an executive on a fact finding trip
to the United States. This turned out to be an extended
trip with Lyons' Tom Goldsmith working hands-on in every
aspect of the Mister Softee organisation before reporting
back to the Lyons Board.
Further meetings took place
between Smith’s Delivery Vehicles and Lyons with the
outcome being an agreement to move forward in the form of
a joint venture between the two companies. The initial outcome
was the launch of the first mobile ice cream factory* (in
Mister Softee livery) at the 1958 Commercial Motor Show,
Earls Court. Three prototype vans were initially built with
Lyons evaluating two of them from their Bridge Park (Greenford)
factory over the winter of 1958/9. It was also important
that the all-new tinned sterile mix (being specially developed
for Mister Softee at Cadby Hall) worked well in the American
ice cream machines. By January 1959 the two firms were ready
to cement their relationship by setting up two new companies,
Mister Softee (UK) Ltd and Mister Softee (International)
Ltd. Smith’s Delivery Vehicles held the majority shareholding
(61 per cent) with Lyons' Tom Goldsmith heading up the two
companies as Managing Director.
Mister Softee was, from the
outset, a franchise operation with the first vans operating
in the South West London/Kent borders in the Spring of 1959.
With an initial cost of £3,200, a Mister Softee van
cost as much as six or seven conventional Lyons Maid vans.
However, the cost was progressively reduced and Lyons also
began to run their own in-house operation by putting them
into their own depots. The first Lyons depots to receive
Mister Softee vans were Massarella Supplies Ltd of Doncaster,
(a wholly owned subsidiary of Lyons purchased in 1953).
Mister Softee went from strength
to strength and by 1961 had already established 34 locations
in England and one in Wales. With Mister Softee taking off
in a big way, Lyons knew they had a winner and therefore
decided to make Smith’s Delivery Vehicles a substantial
offer for their majority shareholding which was accepted
(circa mid-sixties). This then brought the whole Mister
Softee operation under the umbrella of Glacier Foods Ltd,
a wholly owned Lyons subsidiary. Mister Softee by now had
become a Lyons flagship brand with depots nationwide and
franchised operations abroad. By 1968 Mister Softee vans
were operating in 15 countries from Belgium to Australia.
Lyons’ static sites, such as Wimpy Bars, sold soft
ice cream under the Tastee-Freeze name. The ice cream mix
was made at Lyons’ Bridge Park factory at Greenford
and some say, it was indistinguishable from Mister Softee
ice cream.
By the time Tonibell joined
the Glacier Foods stable of brands in December 1968, the
soft ice cream revolution had peaked. Competition in the
mobile sector was intense and profitability would inevitably
start a slow decline fuelled by cheap supermarket products
and home freezers. The ubiquitous corner shop held a large
range of frozen confectionery and congested residential
streets made it harder for the 'stop-me-and-by-one' trade
to operate. By the end of the 1970's the writing was on
the wall for any large corporate capital investment into
the mobiling sector of the ice cream industry. Today mobiling
is a fraction of its former size and is now dominated by
owner drivers.
During this slow decline,
Mister Softee faired little better than other brands and
by the 1980's it seemed that someone had let go of the corporate
helm at Glacier Foods, and it showed. To many it seemed
that Mister Softee was left to fend for itself. The killing-off
of the smiling face of 'Cone Head' (at the altar of modernity)
was seen by franchisees up and down the country as a retrograde
step. The brand image continued to dilute and no longer
did Mister Softee convey one strong corporate visual image.
Nestlé acquired the brand from Allied-Lyons (via
the short lived Clarke Foods Ltd involvement) in December
1992. It is unclear when the Mister Softee brand was officially
axed by Nestlé but the name remained on new Nestlé
vans along with the Lyons Maid logo until at least the mid
1990s. Nestle sold their ice cream business to Richmond
Foods Ltd in September 2001.
In 1959 Lyons were in the
vanguard of the new soft ice cream revolution and well ahead
of Walls who had to purchase the Mr.Whippy organisation
to catch up. As a flagship brand within Lyons, Mister Softee
became a household name up and down the country. Today the
term Mister Softee & its main rival Mr.Whippy have entered
the English language as a term for a soft ice cream. Unfortunately,
few of the old Lyons ice cream brand names exist but Mister
Softee is alive and relatively well, and back where it all
started on the eastern seaboard of America. This year (2006)
the Mister Softee brand celebrates it's 50th birthday.
*Prior to 1956 ice cream was
pre-made at the factory and then kept in a hold-over cabinet
on the ice cream van which became known as ‘factories’.
Hence the slogan ‘Freshly made just for you’
really meant what it said.
Steve Tillyer
August 2006
|
