Ambrosia is a brand of food products in the United Kingdom. Its original product was a dried milk powder for infants, but it is now mostly known for its custard and

rice pudding Rice pudding is a dish made from rice mixed with water or milk and other ingredients such as cinnamon, vanilla and raisins. Variants are used for either desserts or dinners. When used as a dessert, it is commonly combined with a sweetener such ...

. The brand plays on the fact that it is made in

Devon Devon ( , historically known as Devonshire , ) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South West England. The most populous settlement in Devon is the city of Plymouth, followed by Devon's county town, the city of Exeter. Devo ...

, England, (at a factory in Lifton), with their original punning

strapline Advertising slogans are short phrases used in advertising campaigns to generate publicity and unify a company's marketing strategy. The phrases may be used to attract attention to a distinctive product feature or reinforce a company's brand. Etym ...

''"Devon knows how they make it so creamy"''.

History

The Ambrosia Creamery was founded in 1917 by Alfred Morris, in his home village Lifton in Devon, to make rich food for infants. He took milk from local farms, where most of the cows were the Red Ruby breed, and dried it with roller dryers. The product soon came to the attention of the British armed forces, who took significant quantities for its soldiers, still fighting in the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

. Just prior to the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

, the Ambrosia creamery was the first company to start making creamed

ready in a tin. Following the outbreak of war, the vast majority of production was placed in

Red Cross The International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement is a humanitarian movement with approximately 97 million volunteers, members and staff worldwide. It was founded to protect human life and health, to ensure respect for all human beings, and ...

food parcels. After the end of hostilities, Ambrosia relaunched the product, along with a creamed macaroni pudding. In 1957, following increasing demand, the creamery opened a new factory near to the original production facility. In 1990 the entire company was acquired by

Colman's Colman's is an English manufacturer of mustard and other sauces, formerly based and produced for 160 years at Carrow, in Norwich, Norfolk. Owned by Unilever since 1995, Colman's is one of the oldest existing food brands, famous for a limited ra ...

Ltd., a famous brand of

mustard Mustard may refer to: Food and plants * Mustard (condiment), a paste or sauce made from mustard seeds used as a condiment * Mustard plant, one of several plants, having seeds that are used for the condiment ** Mustard seed, seeds of the mustard p ...

. This, in turn, was bought out by

Unilever Unilever plc is a British multinational consumer goods company with headquarters in London, England. Unilever products include food, condiments, bottled water, baby food, soft drink, ice cream, instant coffee, cleaning agents, energy dri ...

in 2001. Unilever sold the brand on in 2004, to

Premier Foods Premier Foods plc is a British food manufacturer headquartered in St Albans, Hertfordshire. The group owns many well-known brands, including Mr Kipling, Ambrosia, Bird's Custard, Angel Delight, Homepride cooking sauces, Lyons, Sharwood's, Loy ...

, where it is still a core brand, alongside others such as Bisto, Oxo and

Sharwood's Sharwood's is a British food company, which specialises in Asian food, established in 1889 and acquired by RHM in 1963, which was then merged into Premier Foods in March 2007. Company products The company produces Indian, Chinese and South Eas ...

. In November 2018, Premier Foods announced that they were investigating the sale of the Ambrosia factory and brand in a move to focus on its growing brands, such as

Batchelors Batchelors is a popular brand of predominantly dried food products. The Bachelors company was founded in 1895 in Sheffield, England by William Batchelor, initially specialising in canned vegetables. It released its first dried soup in 1949, an ...

and

Mr Kipling Mr Kipling is a brand of cakes, pies and baked goods made in Carlton, South Yorkshire and Stoke-on-Trent, and marketed in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia and North America. It was introduced in May 1967 (at a time when cakes were more of ...

, and to accelerate the rate at which it pays down its £510m debt. This sale offer was later withdrawn.

Marketing

In the late 1990s, there were commercials on the Ambrosia splat custards which featured custard splatting into the face of a man who licks it off and replies "Mmmm; strawberry/banana/chocolate flavour" and finally, the end of the theme from

Roobarb ''Roobarb'' (also known as ''Roobarb and Custard'') is a British animated children's television series, created by Grange Calveley and originally shown on BBC1 just before the evening news. Each cartoon, written by Calveley and directed by Bob ...

can be heard. In 1999 Ambrosia launched Ambrosia Splat Custard, aimed at young children. As part of their marketing, they sponsored a popular Saturday-morning kids' TV show

SMTV Live ''SMTV Live'' (an abbreviation of ''Saturday Morning Television Live'', and also stylised as ''SM: LIVE'') was a British Saturday morning children's television programme, produced by Blaze Television for ITV. Operating on a similar format to ...

, and, in 2002, Panto.ie's annual pantomime in Dublin. As of the release of Ambrosia Rice pots in 2012, the slogan was changed to "''Devon knows it's unbelievably good''".

References

{{Reflist

External links

Brand websitePremier Foods website
Food manufacturers of the United Kingdom Ambrosia Companies based in Devon British brands