On This Day, 3 January 1918

Birmingham Mail

Thursday 3 January 1918

 

WOMEN OF BIRMINGHAM!

(THE TRUE SHOPPING PUBLIC)

IT IS UP TO YOU TO MAKE A SUCCESS OF THE NEW RATIONING SCHEME

Birmingham is leading the way with its new scheme, as it has in so many ways before. If it succeeds it will probably be adopted as the standard for food control throughout the country. It will succeed if you co-operate and help to make it work.

LET US TALK ABOUT TEA as that is our business. We leave the other things, Butter and Margarine, to those who understand them. The following will give you a general idea of the Scheme, as we understand it to apply to Tea, though of course several details have yet to be arranged.

THE WHOLE AIM is to secure to each citizen of Birmingham, rich and poor, his or her fair share of what there is available, and to do away with the necessity for queues.

THE LORD MAYOR has formulated the scheme. It is never an easy task to be Lord Mayor, but, in these days of stress, and in this particular instance, it is up to everyone of us to help him over the initial difficulties which are so great.

CONFUSION AND MUDDLE are easy to complain of, and if there is any such, it is because people do not understand and because of the way that rumours and wrong impressions are foolishly spread.

TEA IS BEING FAIRLY APPORTIONED so far as each town and city is concerned. The Government regulates the quantity according to the population, and the tea is distributed through wholesale merchants, packers and others, sometimes more and sometimes less, according the tea ships arrive or are sunk on their voyage.

LOCAL DISTRIBUTION NEEDS IMPROVEMENT. It is the distribution amongst the retailers after the tea reaches the city that requires re-arrangement. Birmingham authorities have now ascertained from each retailer who are his usual wholesale suppliers, and how much he has been having. They will also know, after Saturday next, exactly how many people have registered with each shop, so it will then simple, although involving great deal of work, for the authorities to send instructions the wholesalers telling them in future how to divide amongst their retail customers the tea which Birmingham as a city is entitled. The only difference in future will be that, if more people than usual want to go to Mr. A. B. C,’s shop for tea, and less people than usual want to go to Mr. X. Y. Z.’s shop, the wholesale supplier, whether in Birmingham or London, will be asked to vary the supplies to these grocers accordingly.

Given a little time and patience, the whole thing should settle itself very comfortably in the course of a week or two. Such matters as children home from boarding schools, soldiers on leave, public institutions and caterers, are being dealt with specially.

YOU MUST REGISTER AT ONCE. If you have not done so,  you should fill in your card and take it to the shop where you deal; but if your card has not reached you, one may be obtained at the School of Art in Margaret Street (near the Council House).

YOU WILL GET TO START WITH 1 oz. for every member of your household per week, but it is hoped to increase this very soon.

YOU MAY CHOOSE PACKET OR LOOSE TEAS. An impression has got abroad that no packet teas may be ordered, but it is not correct. If your card showed you to be entitled to 2 oz. a week, you can have a ⅟4-lb. packet to last a fortnight; or, if entitled to 9 oz., your dealer could hand you ⅓ lb. packet and weigh you out an extra oz. to make up- and the same with other odd quantities.

THE SPACES ON YOUR CARD are marked with “For the week ending—.” This does not mean that the retailer must wait until the end of the week to sell anyone her share; it only means that the quantity sold is to apply to that week. It may be sold the week before, or it may be sold on any day during the proper week.

…

MAKE THE SCHEME WORK!!

It is up to the people of Birmingham to follow the lead of their Lord Mayor, and once more give a lead to the country. If there are any difficulties that require explanation, you will have to go to the Art School in Margaret Street where your difficulties will be removed by that paragon of patience and endurance, Mr. Cooke, -one of the men to whom a monument will yet be erected. Behind all, there is the keen organising intellect of Mr. Minshull and his colleagues, who will be able to unravel any intricacies affecting the larger problems of the wholesalers that may arise. That present rationing scheme successful there is no doubt, and it is all the more desirable in view of the fact that before long a system of rationing will have to be applied to many other articles.

SPECIAL NOTICE To Users of “Ty-phoo” Leaf Edge Tea.

A large number of our users have been told by retailers that “Ty-phoo” will no longer be available because it is a “packet tea”. This is quite wrong, and everyone of our agents is entitled to receive from us that quantity of tea which may be required of him by “Ty-phoo” users. If a retailer has not put our name down, the user of “Ty-phoo” will have to transfer her custom to a retailer who has put our name down, and we shall be glad to give anyone the required information. It is of no use any retailer saying that he “cannot deal in packet teas” for the simple reason that Birmingham as a city is entitled to and will continue to receive its share of our output, and if one grocer does not sell it, another will. It means that those of our users who, by reason of indigestion or other gastric disorders can only drink “Ty-phoo” will have to transfer their custom to retailers who will have nominated us as the suppliers of part of their requirements.

SUMNERS’ TY-PHOO TEA LTD., CASTLE STREET, BIRMINGHAM.

 

A Note on Rationing in Birmingham:

Rationing in Britain was introduced primarily as a voluntary scheme in 1917. This was introduced in order to minimise the threat of a food shortage in Britain due to the start of a series of British import ships being sunk by the German Navy.

This then led to formal enforcement in 1918 and the start of rationing cards, with sugar being the first item to have formal rationing imposed. According to Lethbridge Birmingham City Council made their Food Committee an official body and on January 1^st 1918 tea and butter were rationed.[1] There was a national scheme of rationing by July 1918.[2]

In Birmingham, the ‘Typhoo’ Tea Company faced threats from the ‘The Tea Control’ meaning that tea had to be rationed and identical in price.[3] Petitions numbered in the thousands over keeping the famous Typhoo lead edge tea rather than adopting ordinary tea packets. On March 1919 the end of tea controls was announced and the Typhoo business expanded.[4]

For further reading on the introduction of the rationing system in World War One, refer to the following articles:

http://www.mylearning.org/wwi-food-shortages-and-rationing/p-4628/ http://www.iwm.org.uk/history/rationing-and-food-shortages-during-the-first-world-war https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rationing_in_the_United_Kingdom

 

-Natalia Siemens

 

Bibliography:

Lethbridge, J, P., Birmingham in the First World War (Birmingham, 1993).

Williams, K., The Story of Typhoo and the Birmingham Tea Industry (1990).

[1] J. P. Lethbridge, Birmingham in the First World War (Birmingham, 1993), p. 45.

[2] Ibid.,

[3] K. Williams, The Story of Typhoo and the Birmingham Tea Industry (1990), p. 67.

[4] Ibid., p. 70.