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Darrell Lea history
Darrell Lea company history timeline
The confectionery company Darrell Lea was founded in Sydney by an English immigrant, Harry Lea, in 1927, and named after his youngest son.
Harry Lea and his wife began selling homemade confectionery through their fruit shop in Manly, then opened a shop in Sydney’s Haymarket in 1927 and introduced the Darrell Lea brand.
The first record of family members earning a wage would not be for another six years, in 1935.
Ltd, was officially registered and as 1936 rolled around, a factory was opened at 1 York Street under the first arch of the Sydney Harbour Bridge.
The first interstate store opened in Melbourne’s Swanston Street in 1940 and the company continued to expand.
Harry died in 1957 aged 81, but not before creating, as a result of a recipe gone awry, his signature soft eating liquorice and handing over the Company to sons, Darrell, Monty and Harris.
Monty’s son Jason entered the business in 1962 but when he took over as CEO his determination to hire senior managers from outside the family eventually led to a disintegration of the business.
Come 1990, Darrell Lea, could lay claim to being the country’s largest player in the confectionery market which came as no surprise given the regular queues of people at their shop counters to buy from the over 800 product lines with favourites like Rocklea Road,
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Zippia gives an in-depth look into the details of Darrell Lea, including salaries, political affiliations, employee data, and more, in order to inform job seekers about Darrell Lea. The employee data is based on information from people who have self-reported their past or current employments at Darrell Lea. The data on this page is also based on data sources collected from public and open data sources on the Internet and other locations, as well as proprietary data we licensed from other companies. Sources of data may include, but are not limited to, the BLS, company filings, estimates based on those filings, H1B filings, and other public and private datasets. While we have made attempts to ensure that the information displayed are correct, Zippia is not responsible for any errors or omissions or for the results obtained from the use of this information. None of the information on this page has been provided or approved by Darrell Lea. The data presented on this page does not represent the view of Darrell Lea and its employees or that of Zippia.
Darrell Lea may also be known as or be related to Darrell Lea and Darrell Lea Chocolate Shops Pty Ltd.