The success continues: 25 years of Hofdrogerie Carl Roth

A fleet of four tricycles and a horse and cart show how successful the so called “Hofdrogerie” (court chemist´s store) Carl Roth already was back in 1904. The company celebrated its 25th anniversary in its home town, which passed the 100,000 inhabitant-mark just a few years before, officially making it a city. In 1904, the Hofdrogerie Carl Roth was already a well-established part of trade and industry in Karlsruhe. The company had as many as 39 employees by then. What’s more, a motorised delivery vehicle was added to the fleet just five years later.

One of the company’s most successful products back then was Roth’s “court cocoa”. Every year, the company made 25-30,000 packets of that product alone. The picture shows a letter from Lörrach requesting a sample of the cocoa.

The tumult of industrialisation led, among other things, to the merger of major companies BASF in Ludwigshafen and Farbenfabriken Bayer, and in the same year the Bayer Cross was registered as a German trademark.

Another event in 1904 was the entry into force of the Child Protection Act in Germany, which took place on 1 January. It prohibited children under the age of 12 from working in any commercial enterprise. Meanwhile, at the Summer Olympic Games in St. Louis, USA, sack racing was an Olympic sport for the first and only time, along with jumping through barrels and tobacco-juice spitting.