Quest for a New Chocolate Bar

Advisory Phase - Roller Dryer Experiments

In August of 1979, Larry urged Judy to go over the Continuous Crumb Processing file again but this time with a new mission in mind. Larry succinctly stated what their new mission was:

Larry: Judy, we need to find another process that would replicate the flavor that we were getting with the continuous crumb process.

Judy: Where are we going to do the testing?

Larry: It's going to be tricky. We don't have a pilot plant here in Hershey and will not get one because there is no money. The only option I see is to do all research and development right at the Canadian plant. I am not sure how much control we are going to have at the plant, how things are going to turn out, or how long it's going to take. I am only sure of one thing, though: Be ready to do a lot of traveling in the coming months.

With the help of Smiths Falls plant personnel, they looked around for equipment, processes, materials… anything that would help support some of their ideas. After several days searching in Smiths Falls, Larry summarized the results of this search: "There is nothing in the Smiths Falls plant that we can envision would replicate the flavor that we are getting with the continuous crumb process."

Knowing that whatever ideas they would come up with had to be immediately implemented in Canada, Larry had no choice but to continue searching. As he explained his dilemma to Don Thomson, Don suggested Larry talked to some of the staff who had worked in the Canadian operations other than at Smiths Falls. Very soon Larry found himself making plans to go to Montreal. They found out that in Hershey's Y&S Candies plant in Montreal, where they make licorice, there was an old drum drier scheduled to be discarded. Larry asked the people at Montreal to take a look at it and report on its condition.

During a visit to the Y&S Candies plant in Montreal, the plant supervisor directed Larry, Judy and Dave Yach, QA lab manager at the Smiths Falls plant, to what they were looking for, an old roller drier. Since the plant supervisor was a rather busy man, Larry had to rely on the French-Canadian workers, most of whom did not speak English, to start the arduous process of resurrecting the old drum dryer. This made matters somewhat more complex than usual since Larry had to depend mostly on the plant manager to give orders for upgrading this piece of equipment.

After several months of going back and forth between Hershey and Montreal while the Canadians worked on the drum drier, they finally got it cleaned up and running. After a series of tests, a batch of the product was completed in Montreal.

Back at the Hershey Technical Center and in Smiths Falls, the verdict regarding the new chocolate product made in the Y&S Candies plant in Montreal was unanimous. Someone summarized the general feeling as follows:

"This is good stuff… But it does not have the same flavor. It isn't just what we are looking for."

One cold December night in Montreal, at the hotel, Larry calculated how much money it would take to repair, remove and install "this thing" in Smiths Falls. When he added all the numbers, he realized that the drum drier was, as Larry recalled later, "too beat up to do the job." He wasn't even sure how long it would take to arrive at the flavor he was looking for. He realized that this was the first direction they had taken after the continuous crumb equipment got turned down. He felt that this approach was also bound to fail.

Larry thought as he was laying in bed, "Well, it's time to go home now."