Heinz is celebrating the 100th anniversary of its Cream of Tomato soup in the U.K., so the company is re-releasing its original 1910 label on limited-edition cans.
Heinz Cream of Tomato soup first went on sale in the U.K. at Fortnum & Mason, a department store, in 1910. That’s the same year Portugal became a republic and “Titanic” actress Gloria Stuart was born. To celebrate the soup’s anniversary, Fortnum & Mason is creating a window display around the original label and is selling the limited-edition cans.
[RELATED: Heinz squeezes out new ketchup packet]
Heinz Cream of Tomato soup was originally manufactured in Canada and imported into the U.K. After World War I, though, Heinz opened a factory in London, which helped the soup grow in popularity. Over the last 100 years, Heinz has sold 8.2 billion tins of Cream of Tomato. In January 2010, a record 57 million cans of Heinz soup were sold in the U.K.
The H. J. Heinz Company, whose world headquarters are in Pittsburgh, Penn., is probably best known for its ketchup. The company says it has sold over 650 million bottles of Heinz Ketchup around the world in more than 140 countries, with annual sales of more than $1.5 billion. The ketchup giant also claims to use more tomatoes than any other company in the world. It says over two million tons of tomatoes are processed every year for its products.
And although ketchup is the most famous Heinz product today, when it was started by Henry Heinz in 1869, the first product he sold was actually bottled horseradish. It was made from his mother’s own recipe.
Happy anniversary Cream of Tomato!
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