Since my last posting, I have once again heard from my “source” at HP Foods in Birmingham regarding some details about the impending closure of the factory. As one would expect, most factory employees will be given a retention fee to ensure sauce production continues as per normal. This retention fee is above and beyond any offered redundancy packages.

The R&D department meanwhile has received offers of employment to relocate to Worcester some 30 miles south of Birmingham. Worcester as you may know is the home of Lea & Perrins Worcestershire sauce, also owned by Heinz (formerly HP Foods). It appears this offer now extends to all R&D employees which is up from the initial announcement of only 8 available positions. Those willing to relocate will be able to take advantage of a relocation package - although it is assumed that most people will opt to commute the 30 miles.

In regards to maintaining the quality and history of the Sauce, my “source” tells me that Heinz are spending a vast amount of time and money to try to match it over in Holland. Hearing this is indeed re-assuring and my “source” is quietly confident that the sauce will in fact be matched.

The ownership of HP Foods has changed hands numerous times in its long history and the impending change to the production of HP Sauce in Holland by Heinz as its new owner marks yet another milestone. For good or for bad, the closure of the Aston factory is a historic event for all those connected to the Sauce.

Most of us who have long enjoyed HP Sauce have never visited or seen images of the place where Edwin Samson Moore first founded the Midland Vinegar Company, home of HP Sauce. If we’ve seen images of the factory at all it would most likely be of the factories exterior much like this one. What the interior of this old factory looks like remains a mystery to most, and I think it would be a terrible shame to let images of a historic working factory to go undocumented and unpublished.

As silly as this may sound to some, I would personally love to visit the factory myself and document the people, the architecture and the general history of the place through photography. This site has allowed me to explore my interests in both preserving and publishing historical information and exploring my own photography interests. My own (non HP Sauce variety) photography can be seen at: stock.xchng. I would love to physically experience this place, to document it and to share it with others who may have a similar interest.

I do realise that the chances of this happening are very remote. Short of receiving an invitation and an airline ticket from Heinz, this simply isn’t going to happen. This is why I have issued a plea to my “source” at HP Foods to pass around the idea of creating a photographic diary of the Birmingham HP Sauce factory, as to my knowledge this has never been done. I would like to make the same request here to anyone who may have the means by which to perform this task on our behalf. If you or if you know of someone who may be able to do this, please have them contact me.

Many thanks to my “source” for indulging me and my many questions. It’s much appreciated!

It has now been a couple of weeks since Heinz officially announced the closure of the HP Sauce factory in Birmingham, England (blogged here) and to be honest, I’ve deliberately put off writing a follow up commentary until I’d had a chance to really let the implications of this announcement sink in. It is absolutely infuriating to see this historic brand being picked apart like this…little by little, week after week.

First, let’s go back to the day of the announcement on August 24th, 2006 when I was contacted by two individuals. The first was someone working for an English language Dutch television network wishing to conduct an interview. While I would have accepted the opportunity despite having serious doubts about seeing myself on television (shudders violently), the logistics of it made an interview impossible. The other individual to contact me was this colourful character, “Captain Beany” (pictured).

Captain Beany wrote:

CAPTAIN BEANY,LEADER AND SOLE CAMPAIGNER OF THE NEW MILLENNIUM BEAN PARTY IS WILLING TO ENDORSE HIS SAUCY COMMITMENT TO SAVE THE H.P SAUCE FACTORY IN BIRMINGHAM!
I WOULD LOVE TO MAKE A PLACARD PROTEST OUTSIDE THE GATES WITH OTHER COMPANY WORKERS AND GET SOME MEDIA PUBLICITY FOR YOU TOO!
PLEASE FEEL FREE TO ACCESS MY APOLITICAL WEB SITE BELOW - www.nmbp.org.uk
PLEASE FEEL FREE TO CONTACT ME IN THE NEAR FUTURE!
POWER TO THE PEOPLE!!!
CAPTAIN BEANY

I have since been in contact with Mr Beany, but as I explained to the Dutch media - living in Canada somewhat limits my ability to support the cause on the ground as it were. Alas Mr Beany I won’t be able to raise my placard with you outside the gates of the HP Sauce factory! I would invite you however to keep up the good fight which I’ll happily document on this site so all HP Sauce fanatics can continue to track your progress - albeit from afar.

I also made an attempt to get in contact with my “source” at HP Foods, to whom I offered my sincere condolences. Unfortunately I never received a response. I can only speculate that perhaps Heinz has purposefully put an end to that relationship, which is a real shame. When I first made contact with this individual, there was a sense of excitement in the tone of the emails which we exchanged. Things were going well at HP Foods with new varieties on the horizon and the “Save The Proper British Cafe” campaign was about to launch. How things have changed in such a short period of time!

Back to the present:

There now appears to be a legal battle brewing over the rights to use the famous British parliament logo. Tesco would like to use the logo on their own brand of brown sauce “Branstons”. I would presume the North American equivalent would be if Safeway did the same with one of their “Safeway Select” sauces.

There has been some healthy debate about which other brand to switch allegiance - Branstons being one of them, and while I understand where people are coming from I whole heartily disagree that the HP label should be re-assigned to another brand. Putting the parliament logo on another brand does not make it HP Sauce. It cannot. There is so much more to this brand than what is simply stuck on the bottle. It is the 100+ year old recipe within the bottle which makes HP Sauce..HP Sauce!

There lies the complication. Suppose a year from now Heinz is producing HP Sauce from its factory in Holland but it has lost the right to use the parliament buildings on its label. The recipe may have survived but what of the brand itself? Can it survive a re-branding under a Heinz label? I would have to argue that the general British public will finally wake up one day to a cold new reality and realise what has happened when they no longer see HP Sauce being sold on the shelves but rather some other bottle - perhaps of similar shape with a new label and a new name. How will they react when by that time it is all sadly far too late to do anything about it? It is a bit of their culture being stolen from them, plain and simple, and it is something the people of Birmingham already know all too well. No swapping of labels can change that.