Case with Questions J Cadbury 1
j Case with questions Cadbury 1 Cadbury is a very well known British confectionery company. Originally a family fi rm started by John Cadbury and grounded in Quaker values and ideals, it started life in 1824 as a shop selling chocolate as a virtuous alternative to alcohol. It went on to become a large-scale manufacturer of chocolate based at the now legendary Bournville factory, built in 1879, and its picturesque workers’ village with its red-brick terraces, cottages, duck ponds and wide open parks. Over the next 100 years Cadbury developed the products that have become so familiar: Dairy Milk in 1905, Milk Tray in 1915, Flake in 1920, Creme Egg in 1923, Roses in 1938 and more. From 1969 it traded as Cadbury Schweppes plc until, in 2008, it separated its global con- fectionery business (which retained the name ‘Cadbury’) from its US beverages business, which was renamed Dr Pepper Snapple Group Inc. Cadbury Schweppes had already sold off most of its beverages businesses in other countries around the world, a process started in 1999 and concluded in 2009 with the sale of its Australian beverages business. The reason for the exit from the beverages business was to enable Cadbury to focus more clearly on what it saw as its core strengths in confectionery, and better enhance shareholder value. Beverages had become the ‘poor sister’ in the relationship, with a separate management structure but delivering growth below the targets for the company. In 2008 the newly de-merged Cadbury set as its goal maintaining its market leadership position, and leveraging its scale and advantaged positions so as to maximise growth and returns.
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