Her Majesty The Queen and His Royal Highness The Duke of Edinburgh visited the Heinz Beanz factory on May 21 to mark the 50th anniversary of the official opening of the factory on May 21, 1959.
The Heinz canned food factory, based in Kitt Green near Wigan in England, makes more than 1 billion cans a year and 1.5 million cans of Heinz Beanz every day. It is the largest food processing plant in Europe and the largest of Heinz's factories around the world.
A new Heinz packing operation was also opened and started by The Queen and The Duke of Edinburgh during the visit. The state-of-the-art, robotic line for the automatic handling of “dollies”, the wheeled sales units which feature directly in supermarket store aisles, is dedicated to keeping pace with demand for some of the nation's favorite foods including Heinz Beanz, Cream of Tomato Soup and Heinz Spaghetti.
The Heinz Kitt Green factory was first opened on May 21, 1959, by the Lord Chancellor, the Rt. Hon. Viscount Kilmuir. Just a few weeks after the official opening, the factory was honored with a visit by HM Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother June 24, 1959.
Scott O'Hara, executive vice president, president and chief executive officer at Heinz Europe, said; "The visit by The Queen and The Duke of Edinburgh is a tremendous honor for Heinz, which we share with immense pride. This year marks the occasion when The Queen will have been proclaimed Queen for 57 years – a number that is also rather significant to Heinz. This makes today's visit even more special."
This year Heinz is also celebrating 140 years since the company's first product, grated horseradish, was sold in 1869.
In the United Kingdom, Heinz varieties first went on sale in London's Piccadilly store Fortnum & Mason in 1886.
Notes:
What does the "57" stand for in Heinz's famous slogan, "57 Varieties?"
While riding a train in New York City in 1896, Henry Heinz saw a sign advertising 21 styles of shoes, which he thought was clever. Although Heinz was manufacturing more than 60 products at the time, Henry thought 57 was a lucky number. So, he began using the slogan "57 Varieties" in all his advertising. Today, the company has more than 5,700 products around the globe, but still uses the magic number of "57."
The main Packaging Hall at the Heinz Kitt Green site has benefited from significant investment over the last 10 years so as to keep pace with consumer demand for some of the nation's favorite foods and the production of over a billion Heinz cans a year.
Most recently, a new high tech multi-pack unit and a multi-million pound investment in a new shrink wrapping operation has been completed. This has now been complemented in May 2009 with an additional multi-million pound investment in the state-of-the-art, automatic handling of merchandising units – called dollies – which are delivered to the largest supermarkets around the country and feature directly in store aisles.
This is the latest in a series of investments in the Heinz Packaging Hall which over the last 10 years have helped to drive higher efficiencies and more sustainable use of resources.
