Remembering Carr's: the illustrious biscuit business

In 1831, Jonathan Dodgson Carr formed a small bakery and biscuit factory in Carlisle. He received a royal warrant in 1841. Within 15 years of being founded, the site had become Britain’s largest baking business.

Carr’s was both a mill and a bakery, producing bread by night and biscuits by day. The biscuits were loosely based on those taken on long voyages by sailors. They could be kept crisp and fresh in tins, and despite their fragility, could easily be transported to other parts of the country by canal and railway.

Jonathan Carr protested against the Corn Laws, which placed steep tariffs on imported wheat to keep the price of British wheat artificially high. This meant bread was expensive even in times of famine. Carr died in 1884, but by 1885, the company was making 128 varieties of biscuit and employing 1,000 workers.

Carr’s became part of Cavenham Foods in 1964 and in 1972, was sold to United Biscuits. This in turn was sold to the Turkish-based multinational Yıldız Holding in 2014.

Among members of the Carr family who worked for the business was former Commando Capt. Richard Carr MBE. He was decorated for repeated escape attempts from Italian and German prisoner-of-war camps in the Second World War.

The factory today is known officially as McVitie's but still known locally as Carr’s.
In 2005, it lost two months’ production due to flooding and, in 2015, more flooding caused by Storm Desmond forced another month-long closure.

Production and distribution gradually resumed in spring 2016 thanks to a £1m government grant.

In March 2012, it was announced that Carr’s Table Water biscuits had lost their royal warrant due to ‘changing tastes’ in the royal households. Carr’s promptly licensed the coat of arms of the City of Carlisle to replace the royal coat of arms on its packaging.