How my uncle gave KitKat its biggest break

As one of Britain's best-loved chocolate bars – the KitKat – celebrates its 75th anniversary, a man has claimed his forward-thinking uncle saved the snack from oblivion. Peter Stanhope's uncle Thomas Thompson worked in product development at the famous Rowntree factory in York in the 1930s.

Now Peter, after laborious research at the University of York's Borthwick Institute, has found documents which reveal directors at the plant had reservations about the potential success of the Rowntrees Chocolate Crisp – which later became KitKat.

But Thomas persuaded them to persevere, saving it from the scrapheap, and the rest is confectionery history.

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Peter, 71, of Haxby, near York, said: "There has long been a family legend about Uncle Tom, my mother's elder brother, inventing KitKat but I always doubted it. But now I have to apologise to him even though he passed away many years ago."

He added that his relative worked in cream manufacturing experimental – later known as product development. He added: "The directors were not at all sure in the early stages of the future success of their 'Rowntrees chocolate crisp' line and were ready to abandon it.

"It was my Uncle Tom who did the research into manufacturing costs set against his predictions of future sales potential that finally persuaded the board to give it a second chance."

The chocolate bar celebrates its anniversary this autumn.

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