THESE are zesty times for Tangerine Confectionery, where signs of success at its York plant are literally gobstopping.

Phooey to the recession as even now, post Christmas, the machines which churn out more than two billion sweets a year at its huge but hidden site off Low Poppleton Lane, Nether Poppleton, are roaring to keep pace with the new decade’s demand.

Next month the plant will become even busier when manufacture of Candy Plus, a multi-coloured, sherbert-filled ball lollipop, popular all over Europe, is transferred to York from Tangerine’s factory in Brno, the capital of Moravia in the Czech Republic.

Yes, it makes sense as Sterling fares badly against the Euro, but it also indicates the determination of Chris Marshall, managing director, to bring foreign manufacture in-house to make Tangerine a truly British operation.

It is an ambition he has harboured ever since Tangerine bought this site, formerly Monkhill Confectionery, from Cadbury Schweppes, at the end of 2007 to add to its plants in Cleckheaton, Pontefract, Blackpool, Poole and Liverpool, plus its Holmwood Distribution Centre in Chesterfield.

Since then, output at the York factory has soared, from 10,190 tonnes in 2007 to 10,914 tonnes in 2008 and last year, in spite of the recession, reached 11,697 tonnes.

York’s affable factory manager, Tony Wade, says: “We thought that during the economic downturn people would see sweets as, luxury. But the effect was just the opposite. People regarded sweets as an affordable way to reward themselves and it was absolutely mental last year as our order books filled.”

Now, apart from the extra work from the Czech Republic, Mr Wade is bracing himself to play York’s part in a new drive to sell Tangerine products into Australia. As reported in The Press last week, York will help other plants to produce more Taveners Proper Sweets as a result of a distribution deal with Australian Bulk Foods to supply more supermarkets Down Under.

And that is just the start of a drive to push even more English “nostalgic” sweets on to the former colonial markets like Canada, South Africa and Hong Kong in the hope of doubling its exports from five to ten per cent of the group’s £165 million turnover.

Then there is the seemingly insatiable and growing demand from the likes of Marks & Spencer, Asda, Sainsburys, Tescos and Morrisons for products like rough-cut fudge, Giant Lollipops, York Toffee, Raspberry Ruffles, strawberry bon-bons and lemon and strawberry sherberts.

And even small town stores are going retro and stocking up with more old favourites, such as Pear Drops, Rhubarb and Custard sweets and Cola Cubes.

It means that in York at least sugar confectionery is now holding its own very nicely thank you, against a particularly troubled and volatile chocolate industry.

While Cadburys, once the masters of this plant, is now itself the subject of takeover attempts and everyone is feeling the effects of the closure of Terrys chocolate plant in York three years on from the decision of Kraft Foods to move production to Eastern Europe, Tangerine is flying high, employing 280 to 320 people depending on the seasonal demand.

And rising with it is the York plant’s status as a workplace. Tony says: “Once it was the last of the choices as a place to work, pipped by the likes of Terrys, the old carriageworks and Ben Johnsons printers, later to become RR Donnelley. Now it is the first as our wages become more competitive and investment means that it is a far more pleasant environment.”

It is likely to become even more attractive as Tangerine gradually drops the old Cadburys reliance on about 140 agency workers and moves to creating new part-time employee shifts on some production lines.

Next week , after advertising in The Press, nine new recruits start in the Ruffles, cut-and-wrap and chocolate packing departments. Another 21 will follow later.

Tony says: “We have worked closely with the GMB Union on this and everyone agrees that it will not only give our 24-hour manufacture better consistency, but also offer stability because they will become permanent part-time employees.”

It’s a sweet thought.

Earning their stripes

GLUTINOUS ‘casings’ of sugar, water and glucose look for all the world like giant loaves of plastic bread in the “engine room” of sweetie-making at Tangerine Confectionery in York.

They have just dropped off a conveyor belt and are rapidly cooling from 300 deg F. The casings have already been injected with natural dyes and juices; one is brown, the other cream. They have been spun and stretched at high speed to turn them opaque.

Mike Berry and Steve Harbron are about to fashion the lumps into a mouth-watering boiled confection. They are still young but both are time-served experts in the traditional art of making sweets by hand.

When the casings arrive at their leather-topped worktable, Mike and Steve pull, knead and flatten the mixture. They make it look easy; it is not. The pair are working with bare hands which allows them to feel when the consistency is just so – despite its temperature still measuring 100 degrees.

Steve cuts the pieces in half, then he and Mike roll alternating stripes of the two colours before joining them to make a brown and cream sandwich. A large blob of toffee is placed in the middle and wrapped inside it.

The pair have produced a giant one-metre-long humbug. Are they going for a place in the Guinness book of records? No, when they place their gargantuan sweetie into a hopper, all is revealed.

A sizing roller threads their humbug until it resembles a squeeze of toothpaste. Finally a cutter transforms it into thousands of tiny striped sweets which tumble into a waiting basket.

Making sweets has been a life’s work for Ernie Nyhan, pictured left, who has worked on just about every machine in the factory. Now he is the company’s technical support trainer. He said: “It is rare to find the craft of making sweets by hand because these days health and safety has forced automation on almost all manufacturers.

“But tempering by hand gives a lighter texture and after a few-years experience you can tell when it’s right. We still use a steam heated table with a leather mat on top. It keeps the casing soft enough to stay workable.

“We can make any colour stripe the customer wants. They can have green if they like. We only use natural dyes and it might surprise you to know that we get green from spinach or kiwi fruit.

“Sweet making is still a traditional art here, take our bon-bons. We cover the finished sweets with syrup and then roll them with icing sugar in copper pans that must be 50-years-old; I remember using them when I first started.”

Surely after 40 years of making sweets Ernie must be sick of the sight of them. “Not at all, I still enjoy them as much as when I was a lad. In fact, I’ve just had a humbug. It was delicious.”