William Leverhulme
ran a family grocery business in Bolton. He didn’t live long enough to see his
son William Junior build Britain’s first multinational company. William Junior
became as rich as he was successful from making bars of soap and here I am where
he lies until the planet burns up.
Aged 16 William Junior left school and entered
the family business, working in the warehouse sweeping floors and tidying up.
Being a religious man he often attended church where he saw one of his
neighbours Elizabeth. By aged 23 he proposed and they married two years later. Aged
34 he and his brother bought a small business selling soap and other cleaning
products in Warrington. Lever Brothers was born and business rumbled along
smoothly. They partnered up with a chemist called William Watson who had
invented a new kind of soap not knowing a fortune was about to fall in their
path.
They started manufacturing soap using palm oil
and glycerine. At the time soaps were made from saturated fat from cattle and
sheep. It was a free-lathering soap block which they named Sunlight Soap. They
may have been making gold blocks as this soap brought the brothers a phenomenal
fortune. Over the next decade this new soap - married with William’s marketing
acumen - was selling in 134 countries. He was running the company alone; his
brother James fell ill from diabetes and never took a major part in the
business.
Aged 37 he considered business so healthy he
bought a manor house Thornton Manor in the village of Thornton Hough. Afterwards
he bought the village.
William is buried in Port Sunlight on The Wirral
and here he built a village for his workers. He bought 56 acres of marsh land
and over twenty years built a model village. As chocolate magnate George
Cadbury created Bournville village William created
Port Sunlight - 700 pretty cottages with running hot water, indoor bathrooms,
heating, gardens - all around village greens, parks, schools. He set up classes
where people could learn to cook, make clothes, learn shorthand. There was a
concert hall, theatre, library, a gymnasium and an open air swimming pool.
Rents were cheap (20% of the weekly wage) and something called pension plans
were created for all workers.
By his fifties William was breathtakingly rich
from factories producing 5000 tonnes of soap per year. As more products were
introduced (like ‘Lux’ and ‘Vim’) more cash registers
pinged with profit. Subsidiary companies were set up in the United States,
Switzerland, Canada, Australia and Germany. Reaching his seventies William
employed 250,000 people and in terms of market value he was head of the largest
company in Britain.
Outside business he was elected as a Member of
Parliament for the Liberal Party in the Wirral constituency. He’d go onto
become a baronet, a Lord and even a High Sheriff. He bought a large house in
London and spent most of his adult life there. Not everything was successful
though. He and his wife produced several children but only one son survived. He
spent a £17 million (in today’s money) trying to buy and transform the Isle of
Lewis in Scotland but was forced to back off due to local opposition.
Money doesn't die but people do and returning
from a business trip in Africa William contracted pneumonia. He returned to his
home Inverforth Manor in London where he died aged 74
in 1925.
Here I am at Christchurch Churchyard where he’s
entombed with his wife. They’re not six feet under soil and a towering
headstone but in two raised graves at one end of the church. The funeral brought
30,000 mourners out of their houses.
What happened afterwards? Lever Brothers merged
with Dutch company Margarine Unie and they formed
Unilever which still exists today (every British citizen with a pension plan
probably holds a tiny share of the £50 billion/year titan.) The country manor
is now used for plush weddings (recently subject to a huge fire) and the London
home was converted into two houses and seven apartments.
Time to leave the church that sunny Sunday
afternoon. The church door was open but I didn't let the sign broadcasting
"coffee and cake" pull me inside. In the past I've fallen for these signs
and usually ancient widows grab you, asking you to sit down for a chat, some
stewed tea and dry cake. I'm afraid I did a salute and left.
William,
Elizabeth and their son....