Lindsay Creamery Ltd.
Flavelles Ltd. cold storage and creamery. [after 1917].
Finding it necessary to separate the cold storage business from the creamery business, William and J. D. obtained a separate charter under the name of Lindsay Creamery Limited in 1918. This allowed for the creamery to sell all of its butter and cheese it made to Flavelles Limited for distribution, completing their monopoly in central Ontario.
Lindsay Creamery milk bottle throughout the years.
This was the start of what would become a dominating force in the dairy business. Starting at an annual production of over 100,000 pounds of butter, farmers around central Ontario began to take note of the business being done. Lindsay Creamery became a good place for farmers to sell their product, as it was an inexpensive location to transport cream to and paid well. By 1925, the butter production was reaching over 800,000 pounds yearly. In 1928, the company added a milk department and purchased milk routes around Lindsay, with the primary goal of supplying milk to the residents of Lindsay and surrounding cottage resorts. The business continued as a family affair, eventually including William and J. D.’s children along with their son-in-law James Stanley McLean.
Employees in the churning department. 1918.
Depression caused the creamery and its distributor Flavelles Limited increased difficulty in the late 1930s. Running the business profitably, William Flavelle received money from their younger brother Joseph, to sustain the business for some years to follow. William, in his 90th year and in declining health from a broken hip a year prior, sold his businesses that he grew for more than 60 years to Silverwood Dairies in August 1943, just a few months before his death.
Employees weighing the cream. 1918.
Lindsay Creamery Ltd. advertising sign that would have been displayed in rural areas in and around Victoria County.