Country Maid Bakeries

I took a trip down Memory Lane yesterday when I popped into Saltney to deliver some cards. Before moving to Hoole, I lived in Saltney for many years. And like so many people from Saltney I worked at the Country Maid Bakeries for a while. It was ideal for when you were at school or at college. Not only Saltney people though. Employees came from all over the region.

I worked in a variety of departments in my 4 years or so there. Virtually everyone I knew of the same age worked as a Saturday van lad at some time. My two stints were with Cyril on Run 1 and Kevin on Run 41. Amazing I can still remember their numbers all these years later.

So what of any other Country Maid Bakeries memories?

Country Maid Bakeries

Country Maid Bakeries

An ex-neighbour informed me yesterday that the old Country Maid Bakeries site is to be a new housing estate, called Mayfield. Apparently there are going to be 70+ houses built on the site. Over a cup of coffee we had a good old reminisce about the bakery.

As well as being a Saturday van lad I also worked in the Confectionary Department, the Bakehouse, the Bread Slicers, Racking Up, Forklift Truck driving and the Loading Bay. Living only a five minute walk away meant it was ideal for a part-time school vacation and weekend job.

Confectionary Department

My very first job was working in Confectionary (the “Feccy” as it was better known as) during the run up to Easter. Working 12 hour nights at the age of 16 was a real eye opener. The job entailed packing 6 Hot Cross Buns into a punnet and passing them on for wrapping. Needless to say we ‘took care’ of many of the ‘damaged’ ones by, well eating them.

It got to the stage that I couldn’t even smell a Hot Cross Bun for about 10 years after. I ate so many, the very thought of a Hot Cross Bun made me heave.

There were some really great characters in the ‘Feccy’. Having this as a first job was a fabulous experience and an excellent character building exercise.

My ‘Feccy’ role developed into being entrusted to prepare the mix and actually mix the tea cakes on occasions. A bit of responsibility. It felt great.

But as I said, my days at Country Maid Bakeries were more than just a ‘Feccy Hot Cross Bun Fest’. Probably the most time I spent in any Department was in Despatch. The Despatch Department incorporated the Bread Slicers, Racking Up and the Loading Bay.

Racking Up

Racking Up was basically taking the recently wrapped bread from a conveyor belt and loading into trays. Twenty loaves per tray, eighteen trays per rack. Once your wheeled rack was completed, you simply pushed it away and waited for the forklift truck driver to pick it up and take it out onto the Loading Bay.

Racking Up was a really boring job as you could probably imagine. Like most jobs, it was manned by 2 twelve hour shifts. I remember on one occasion I was working nights (8pm to 8am) with a bloke I got to call “Cello Ray”. The bread came down on conveyor belts all night. Thin sliced, Medium sliced, Toast, Vitbe, Old Fashioned…you name it. There was also a loaf we called Cello. A ‘Cello’ was an unsliced 2lb loaf that was wrapped in clear cellophane.

Each day’s bread wrappings were colour coded. For instance, weekend bread was colour coded yellow. On this particular 12 hour night shift me and Ray were working on opposite sides of the conveyor belt. Ray was a good guy. A typical Cockney and a keen West Ham fan. However, it was often quite difficult to understand what he was saying with his broad Cockney accent.

After a couple of mind numbingly boring hours or so I could hear Ray repeatedly mumbling one word over and over again. It sounded like “Hello”, so I thought he was that bored he took it upon himself to greet each loaf as it came down the conveyor belt. It was like a Chinese torture drip in a sense. He just repeated it over and over.

Aarrrghhh…OK, I Give Up Ray!!

After a while I’d had enough. At this point the 2lb unsliced cellophanes were trundling down the conveyor belt.

“For pity’s sake (or words to that effect – after all this website is child friendly) Ray, give it a rest. Anyway, what on earth are you saying over and over again”

Ray just turned to me and said, “I’m saying ‘Yellow, Yellow’ as it’s a Friday and it’s a yellow colour code day”

Whatever gets you through the 12 hour shift I suppose.

“Oh, ‘Yellow, Yellow’. I couldn’t quite catch what you were saying. As it’s the Cello piling down I thought you might be saying, ‘Cello, Cello’. Any chance you stop repeatedly saying ‘Yellow, Yellow’ now please as it’s doing my head in”

Ray let about a minute pass and I thought great, he’s stopped.

But then all of a sudden he started to pipe up…….., “Yellow, Cello”

It’s surprising how quickly bread piles up on the floor when a conveyor belt is left unmanned as one worker from the belt is throttling the other!!

That Summer Of 1976

Who’s old enough to remember the red hot scorching summer of 1976? I remember it well. One of the main reasons I remember it so well was because for a spell I was working in the Bakehouse. Not a nice little, mixing dough type number. Oh no, I was working on the ovens!! And right above me was a perspex skylight plonked in the middle of the corrugated iron roof.

There must have been about 6 or 7 feet gap between two sets of ovens. The width of the oven meant that there were about 4 or 5 metal trays full of bread rolls rolling off the oven. Absolutely rows and rows of them. The job was to take these trays and place them in a wheely rack. So, you were constantly moving and turning around from oven to oven. Not to worry though as we had great protection to make sure you didn’t burn your hands. Not!!

You were provided with old squares of sackcloth with a hole cut into it for you to slide your hand through. These were your protective gloves. I lost count of the number of times I caught the edge of my ‘gloves’ on the bottom of the tray and placed my bare hand on the bottom of the tray as a result.

The sound of metal crashing to the floor followed by a variety of expletives wasn’t an uncommon sound.

I remember the heat though so vividly. It was stifling to say the least. The heat from the ovens together with the 1976 sun beating down through the perspex skylight was to become a lasting memory.

Fair do’s to Country Maid Bakeries though, they provided free cold drinks. The shift required that you worked in 30 minute rotation with your partner. Your 30 minutes off was invariably spent in the canteen where you didn’t move from the cold drink container.

Yes, the bakehouse was a never to be forgotten experience.

The Dour Scottish Despatch Manager

To be fair he only seemed dour on first impressions. His name was Sid.

He was actually a humorous, personable bloke once you got to know him. I used to work 7 days a week for a while. The 7th day was only a Saturday morning though as me and my good friend Macca (aka Brian) were responsible for cleaning the despatch floor. We would flood the floor with a mixture of bleached water and cleaning solution despatched by a strange sort of floor cleaning piece of machinery. The same machine would then suck the water and dirt up and dry the floor.

Well, that was the theory. It seemed quite simple. I’ve lost count of the number of times me and Macca were standing on a flooded floor with a runaway floor cleaning thingy and Sid shouting “Suck, suck”. Well it sounded like “Suck” anyway.

I think one of the problems about a Saturday morning was that we always had a heavy night on a Friday. Me, Macca, Kevin (Run 41) and a few others used to pop down to the hotspot of the time, The Boathouse.

A hangover and a floor cleaning thingy didn’t go well together. Sid to his credit did try and help us. In fact he often showed quite a bit of concern about us as well. I remember he was particularly concerned about my sleeping patterns on occasions.

Clocking in late for a Saturday morning shift after a heavy Friday night, Sid often exclaimed, “Ah you’re here. What’s the matter, couldn’t you sleep?”

And he was concerned about our whereabouts on occasions. To the extent that he would come looking for us in the canteen and ‘suggest’ that we might like to be back on the Despatch floor. Such careful thoughts!!

On A Cloud

As I’ve said there were so many characters at Country Maid Bakeries. We also had a good football team as it happens. Brian Rodgers was a larger than life character in his role as ‘Feccy’ manager. He was also manager of the football team. One of his sidekicks in both the ‘Feccy’ and the footie team was Tony. He worked many hours and like most of us, worked a shift pattern. He also had a unique nickname.

Story has it that he had finished a night shift (6am finish) and he started to walk home. He lived the other side of Chester so it was a fair walk. This one morning it was pouring with rain and Tony only had his ‘Baker’s Whites’ to wear on the way home. A short sleeved, not very warm, cotton top and cotton trousers.

Apparently a kind soul saw him walking home in the pouring rain. Tony was soaked through. The driver of the car stopped and offered Tony a lift to get out of the rain. Tony declined and carried on. The driver couldn’t quite believe the rejection of his generous offer. As he was about to drive off he said, “But you’re soaked!! You must be on a cloud”

So the name stuck. That’s the version I heard. If anyone else knows of any other reason for his strange nickname then let me know.

Happy Memories

I’m sure I speak for many in saying that I had so many happy memories of Country Maid Bakeries. It was a special place to work. I could post a load more snippets, but I think you get the gist of what it was all about.

When I went past it yesterday and saw all the builders shutters surrounding the site, a part of my life suddenly seemed a distant memory. Having seen that, it prompted me to think about this post and pay my own tribute to the Country Maid Bakeries.

Many thanks to all my fellow Country Maid Bakeries workers who made the four years or so a very enjoyable experience.

Anyone Else Have Their Own Memories?

Anyone else work in the Country Maid Bakeries and have their own memories to share?

Or has anyone got any of their own memories about anything else Chester related? If so, drop me a line.