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The Frito Lei Company
Elmer Doolin, the operator of the Highland Park Confectionery, purchased a corn chip recipe, 19 retail accounts and a potato ricer for $100 from a local manufacturer in 1932. Doolin established a new corn chip business, The Frito Company, in his mother's
kitchen. Doolin, his mother and brother produced the corn chips, named Fritos, and had a production capacity of approximately 10 pounds per hour. Doolin distributed the Fritos in 5¢ bags. Daily sales
totaled $8 to $10 and profits averaged about $2 per day.
In 1933, the hourly production of Fritos increased from 10 pounds to nearly 100 pounds due to the development of a "hammer"
press. By the end of the year, production lines were operating in Houston and Dallas. The Frito Company headquarters also moved to Dallas to capitalize on the city's central location and better availability
of raw materials. In 1937, The Frito Company opened its Research and Development lab and introduced new products including
Fritos Peanut Butter Sandwiches and Fritos Peanuts to supplement Fritos and Fritatos Potato Chips, which had been introduced in 1935.
In 1941, the company opened its Western Division in Los Angeles with two sales routes, which would become the prototype for The Frito Company's distribution system. In 1945, The Frito Sales
Company was established to separate sales from production activities and meet the demands of an expanding population. Expansion by the Frito National Company continued with the issue of six franchises in 1945. In 1950, Fritos were sold in
all 48 states.
The Frito Company issued its first public stock offering in 1954. At the time of Doolin's death in 1959, The Frito Company
produced over forty products, had plants in eighteen cities, employed over 3,000 people and had sales in 1958 in excess of
$50 million. By 1962, Fritos would be sold in 48 countries
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www.fritolei.com
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Collection CD-Rom
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Charles Elmer Doolin is credited as the inventor of the Frito and
a founder of Frito-Lay. Some also credit him with inventing the Cheetos.
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H.W. Lay & Company
In 1932, Herman W. Lay began a potato chip business in Nashville, Tennessee. Lay was hired as a salesman for the Barrett Food Products Company, an Atlanta, Georgia manufacturer of Gardner's Potato Chips and eventually took over Barrett's Nashville warehouse as a distributor. Lay hired
his first salesman in 1934 and, three years later, had 25 employees and a larger manufacturing facility where he produced
popcorn and peanut butter sandwich crackers.
A representative of the Barrett Food Company contacted Lay in 1938, offering to sell Barrett's plants in Atlanta and Memphis for $60,000. Lay borrowed $30,000 from a bank and persuaded the Barrett Company to take the difference in preferred stock.
Lay moved his headquarters to Atlanta and formed H.W. Lay & Company in 1939. Lay later purchased the Barrett manufacturing
plant in Jacksonville, Florida, and additional plants in Jackson, Mississippi, Louisville, Kentucky and Greensboro, North Carolina. Lay retained the Gardner trademark of Barrett Food Products until 1944, when the product name was changed to Lay's Potato Chips.
Lay expanded further in the 1950s with the purchase of The Richmond Potato Chip Company and the Capitol Frito Corporation. By 1956, with more than 1,000 employees, plants in eight cities and
branches or warehouses in thirteen others, H.W. Lay & Company was the largest manufacturer of potato chips and snack foods
in the United States.
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Lay began his career as a 24-year-old
delivery driver. As a travelling salesman for the Barrett Food Company, he delivered potato chips to his customers in his Ford Model A. Lay's territory eventually expanded and his profits began to grow. In 1934, he founded the H.W. Lay
Distributing Company based in Atlanta, Georgia, a distributor for the Barrett Food Products Company, and began to hire employees. By 1937, Lay had 25
employees, and had begun producing his own line of snack foods.
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