Thomas' is a brand of English muffins and

bagel A bagel (; ; also spelled beigel) is a bread roll originating in the Jewish communities of Poland. Bagels are traditionally made from yeasted wheat dough that is shaped by hand into a torus or ring, briefly boiled in water, and then baked. ...

s in

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, established in 1880. It is owned by

Bimbo Bakeries USA Bimbo Bakeries USA, Inc. () is the American corporate arm of the Mexican multinational corporation, multinational bakery product manufacturing company Grupo Bimbo. It is the largest bakery company in the United States. The subsidiary, headquarte ...

, one of the largest baking companies in the United States, which also owns

Entenmann's Entenmann's is a formerly American-owned company, now owned by the Mexican conglomerate, Grupo Bimbo, that manufactures baked goods and delivers them throughout the United States to supermarkets and other retailers for public sales. Often, the ...

Sara Lee Sara may refer to: People * Sara (given name), a feminine given name People with the given name * Sara Aboobacker (1936–2023), Indian writer and translator * Sara Ahmed (born 1969), British-Australian writer * Sara Allgood (1880–1950), Ir ...

, Stroehmann, and Arnold Bread companies. Advertisements for the muffins place emphasis on their "nooks and crannies". The company also produces toasting or swirl bread,

pita Pita ( or ; ) or pitta (British English), also known as Arabic bread (, ), as Lebanese bread and as kmaj (from the Persian ''kumaj''), is a family of yeast- leavened round flatbreads baked from wheat flour, common in the Mediterranean, Levant ...

s, wraps, and bagels.

History

The company was founded by Samuel Bath Thomas (1855–1919). In 1874, he emigrated from

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

and after other menial jobs began working in a bakery. By 1880, he had purchased his bakery at 163 Ninth Avenue in

Manhattan Manhattan ( ) is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the Boroughs of New York City, five boroughs of New York City. Coextensive with New York County, Manhattan is the County statistics of the United States#Smallest, larg ...

, where he featured his namesake muffins that were baked on a griddle, not an oven. The business expanded to 337 West 20th Street (a plaque designates the building as "The Muffin House"). Thomas died in 1919, and the company, S. B. Thomas, was inherited by his daughter and nephews, and was incorporated. Later, it was owned by

George Weston Bakeries George may refer to: Names * George (given name) * George (surname) People * George (singer), American-Canadian singer George Nozuka, known by the mononym George * George Papagheorghe, also known as Jorge / GEØRGE * George, stage name of Gior ...

. Some television commercials for the muffins have highlighted the immigrant story of Thomas, joking about how disappointed his fans in England supposedly were when he decided to take his muffins to America. (Whether the muffins were invented after Thomas had moved to the U.S. is unclear, but the comments in the commercials are not intended to be accurate and are used for a humorous purpose.) In 2010, the company won a

trade secret A trade secret is a form of intellectual property (IP) comprising confidential information that is not generally known or readily ascertainable, derives economic value from its secrecy, and is protected by reasonable efforts to maintain its conf ...

suit when an executive uploaded the company's recipes and retired to work for Hostess. Annual sales in 2010 for Thomas' English Muffins were estimated to be US$500 million.

Notes

External links

* Bagel companies Brand name breads Grupo Bimbo brands Companies established in 1880 {{food-product-stub

History

See also

Notes

External links