George Weston - Amalgamation

Amalgamation

In 1901, George Weston merged his operations with those of flour mill owner J.L. Spink of Pickering, Ontario, to form the Model Bakery Company, Limited. In a letter to the editor, Weston addressed rumors concerning a "bread trust" designed to control the bread business of Toronto, saying they were without foundation and that the amalgamation was intended to do away with "the middle man's profits" in order to give the public better value for their money, while ensuring that the Model Bakery received “nothing but the very choicest flour with which to make our bread."

By late 1902, the Pickering News gave every indication that the merger had been a success:

Those of our readers who have not paid a visit to The Model Bakery at Toronto, should do so at the first opportunity, as there they see the manufacturing of bread done on a collossal scale, can you imagine for a minute what it means to bake a million pounds, (1,000,000) of bread each month, which is 12,000,000 lbs. a year. This is what The Model Bakery have done this year, and their trade is increasing to such an extent, that they are building three more ovens of the most improved kind, as well as extending their cake department. 'Weston's Bread' is delivered daily to all parts of the city and surrounding country, also shipped all over Ontario, as well as to points in Quebec. Their Bakery is supplied by flour entirely from the company's own mill, better known as Spink Mill's, which is located at Pickering, on the main line of the Grand Trunk Railway. Their Mills are kept running night and day to keep the Bakery and their other trade supplied, the Bakery taking some 40,000 barrels of flour a year.

But the partnership, for reasons unknown, did not last. After a few years the mill assets were returned to Spink and Weston and his business partner went their separate ways.