William Wrigley Jr., founder of the Wrigley Chewing Gum empire, started a Chicago-based business in 1891 selling soap. To help sell his soap, he began giving away baking powder with each order. He abandoned his soap business in favor of selling baking powder, which became more popular than his soaps. Again, he decided to include a free insentive — this time he gave away chewing gum with each can of baking powder he sold.

In 1893, he introduced Juicy Fruit and Wrigely’s Spearmint, two of the most recognized modern-day brands of chewing gum. Wrigley later introduced the Doublemint brand in 1914 and promoted it with the famous Doublemint Twins in 1939.

During World War II, Wrigley was impacted by wartime rationing and could not maintain the quaility of its chewing gums. So, its Spearmint, Doublemint and Juicy Fruit brands were produced exclusively for the US military until they were returned to the civilian market in 1946 and 1947.

In later decades and in moden-time, Wrigley released more popular brands like Big Red, Extra Sugar-Free, Winterfresh and Orbit.

About the Wall Sign

You may recognize this sign as the one I used on the side of my Bruce’s Bakery structure. It features Spearmint, one of Wrigley’s oldest brands and is based on a Los Angeles vending machine from 1947.

Save and Print the Sign

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