History
Darrell Lea has been in the ownership of the Lea family since it was founded by Harry Lea, who was born on 15 February 1876 in the East End of London, migrated to Australia in 1888, and started making confectionery in 1917 at the back of his Manly Corso fruit shop. Lea started the first shop in New South Wales in 1927 in Sydney's Haymarket, being a combined milk bar and confectionery shop. During the Depression in 1929, a shop became vacant in Pitt Street, and in 1935 a factory was established under the northern most arch of the Sydney Harbour Bridge at 1 York Street. His first almond noughat creation was called Bulgarian Rock.
Monty (Montague) and Harris Lea, the two middle sons of Harry, opened a manufacturing operation in Melbourne, with their first shop in Swanston Street, in 1940.
Harry Lea died in 1957. Maurice Lea, Harry's eldest son, opened five shops in Brisbane in 1966 and delivered fresh stock until he (Maurice) retired in 1996. Robert Lea, Harris' second son, opened a shop in Adelaide in 1966.
In 1968 the company was listed on the stock exchange, with Darrell as Chairman and Managing Director (Harris became Managing Director in 1971), but was privatised again in 1982, with Jason Durard Lea (28 September 1942 - 12 September 2005), Monty’s son, being Managing Director from 1983 to 1998. Darrell died in 1990, aged 62.
In 1982 the Kogarah factory was rebuilt due to a fire two years before, and set up with modern chocolate-making machinery. In 2004, Darrell Lea licorice was a dessert ingredient at the wedding of Mary Donaldson to Frederik, Crown Prince of Denmark.
In April 2008 Darrell Lea won a 5-year legal battle brought by rival chocolate company Cadbury over Darrell Lea's use of the colour purple on its packaging (which Cadbury uses for its Dairy Milk range packaging), when the Australian judge ruled that Darrell Lea was not trying to fool customers by adopting the shade.
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