Did you know that by decorating your child´s birthday cake or your co-worker´s retirement cake you are keeping a centuries-old tradition alive? The art of baking and decorating cakes can be traced all the way back to the rein of Rameses, an Egyptian pharaoh, in 1175 B.C., evidenced by a painted panel of cakes and breads found at his ancient court bakery. History has found that small cakes, similar to cheesecake, were served to athletes in the first Olympic Games in 776 BC. It has since been carried on throughout the years with many cultures, such as the ancient Romans, Greeks, and much of Medieval Europe having their own take on cake.
The Romans conducted a ceremony known as the confarreation, where a loaf of barley bread was baked for a bride and groom and eaten at the ceremony. In Greece, cakes were baked for various occasions and brought to the temple of Artemis, the Goddess of the Moon. Even in Medieval times, birthday cakes had traditions where a thimble and coin were baked in a cake. The person who would receive the coin would become wealthy and the person who received the thimble would never marry. Through the years various forms and creations have been made with baking cakes, but not until modern times has the real fun began!
Wilton Enterprises, Inc., a leading innovator in cake decorating and candy making designs, products and publications, has followed in the footsteps of these ancient bakers and decorators. The company had its beginnings in 1929 when Dewey McKinley Wilton opened a cake decorating and candy making school for caterers and chefs in a single room of his Chicago, Illinois, home. He grew up working in a candy factory possibly at the age of 14 or 15 years old where he learned to perfect his craft of pulled sugar candy making. He eventually learned about cake decorating from German and French pastry chefs and in return he would teach them about pulled sugar. His first classes charged $25 per lesson, which was considered quite a lot of money in those days. In addition to teaching, Dewey created specialty cakes for fancy caterers all around the Chicago area and worked in various hotel bakeries.
Certain sweets were banned when the Great Depression hit. In order to accommodate, new cake decorating techniques were developed, both for practical and practicing purposes, and new recipes were created. When sugar was rationed, for example, cake decorators used mashed potatoes to practice piping skills, and when the British Ministry of Food put a ban on icing for wedding cakes, bakers covered the cakes with cardboard and decorated the exterior with ornaments such as flowers and paper. Even with such obstacles as these, by 1939 Mr. Wilton began traveling and teaching candy work and pulled sugar to various towns. He would teach approximately five students a day who were mostly bakers or chefs.
The first ad for the school was placed in 1946 in Bakers Helper magazine. The first ad was a full-page black and white ad and drew seven students at $150 for two weeks! At this point classes were still in the Wilton home, but they couldn´t continue to work in such cramped quarters. They decided to move the school to an old lodge hall and the first class at this location accommodated 16 students. By 1948 Wilton´s school had moved twice to accommodate the rapidly growing number of students interested in cake decorating. The new building was about 6,000 square feet and was able to hold more than 18 students! This was just about the time the Wilton family began teaching bakers cake decorating under the GI Bill of Rights. The classes expanded to 40 to 50 students per class and included cake decorating, candy making, and various recipes they could make in a shop to make money. Every other week classes were held in one of the major baker supply houses around the country.
By 1950, the classes in cake decorating started to dwindle, so they moved once again and opened up a Bridal Cake Shop. During this time the Wilton family began work on their first book. At first, no publishers would take a book on cake decorating because they believed it wouldn´t sell, however in 1954, the Wilton´s Encyclopedia of Modern Cake Decorating sold more than 10,000 copies in its first printing. The idea was to be able to take the book to any foreign country and people unfamiliar with the English language would understand cake decorating, so the book contained very little writing and was mostly pictures. Consumers loved the book, and eventually wanted to buy decorating supplies to practice what they were reading about; however, there were no vendors specializing in these items for the public. So in 1959, Norman Wilton started a mail order business. This business made decorating ideas, lists of tubes, paste colors, decorating bags, couplers, parchment paper and metal turntables available to the consumer. They didn´t have enough room to fill out the mail orders in the office, so they were compiled in the basement of the Wilton home.
At that time, they needed to find larger quarters in order to accommodate the increased volume of orders. When they moved into their new 12,000 square foot facility, they started to make their first product, the Tuk-N-Ruffle. Tuk-N-Ruffle was a ruffling that you put around the cake and make the cake appear decorated even before the decoration was on it. In 1964, the first Wilton cake decorating book was published to support the annual cake business and retailed for a mere dollar. The book contained 129 black and white plus some colored pages. In 1970 the first Wilton Yearbook came out in its current form and was published every two years. It became very popular and in 1976 began being published annually. Wilton now has dozens of publications on cake decorating, wedding, baking, cookie and candy making.
As the business grew, Wilton moved to 115th and Halsted St. in Chicago´s Roseland neighborhood where it settled until 1977. Vince Naccarato was announced President of Wilton Enterprises in March 1977 and moved the business to its present location in Woodridge, Illinois.
In 1984, Mr. Naccarato´s vision of the expansion of Wilton Enterprises continued with the purchase of Copco, a cast iron cookware and teakettle company. The acquisition of Copco increased sales and distribution in both domestic and international markets. In 1989 Wilton created the The Weston Gallery, which designed, developed and distributed its own line of picture frames made from a variety of materials. In addition to basic favorites, there was always an influx of new looks and designs that worked with any home décor until 2008.
In 1991, Rowoco, a kitchen gadget company, was acquired and rolled into Copco in 2005. In 1996, a Canadian bakery distributor was purchased and is now the office for Canadian operations.
In 2006, Wilton added a Public Television show, Bake Decorate Celebrate. The show featured decorating ideas and techniques for every occasion. Two feature segments tied each episode together: Decorating Basics provided easy first steps for successful baking and Decorating Tips showed that by using just the featured tip in a decorating bag, many beautiful designs can be created. In 2009 the show released the seventh season and between April and June 2009 over 13.5 million shows were aired in 46 countries.
In 2007 Wilton Industries, Inc was acquired by the private equity firm GTCR to form Wilton Brands Inc.. In 2009 the private equity firm TowerBrook Capital Partners of New York and London acquired a majority interest. Today, Wilton Brands’ largest division is Wilton Enterprises which includes the Copco brand. Wilton Enterprises is today´s market leader in cake, candy, cookie, wedding, bakeware, and home celebration products. The company markets more than 5,000 products. Wilton cake and candy decorating products and publications are available in about 25,000 major department, craft and specialty stores across the country, as well as by mail and on the Internet at www.wilton.com. Wilton continues to operate the world-renowned Wilton School of Cake Decorations and Confectionery Arts with over 1,400 students per year who learn advanced courses and decorating techniques. In addition, 320,000 people annually attend Wilton Method classes in department, craft and specialty shops in their neighborhood. Copco is a leader in business with innovative products that have great design and function. Copco continues distribution of tea kettles as well as thermal mugs and carafes, barware, kitchen storage and even a line of Mario Batali cookware.
Another part of the Wilton Brands’ portfolio is EK Success Brands which is a creative consumer products division with the leading position in the $3 billion scrapbooking market. The company designs and sells some of the craft industry´s most respected brands of stickers, multi-dimensional embellishments, punches and writing utensils for use in scrapbooking and related paper crafts, such as card and invitation creation. These include Jolee’s®, Jolee’s Boutique®, Jolee’s Jewels®, ZIG® Memory System®, Sticko®, Paper Shapers®, HERMA® and Cutter Bee®. The company has a demonstrated history of successful product innovation, having won over 40 design and reader´s choice awards since 2002. The company also launched the Martha Stewart Crafts line in May 2007. Wilton maintains a solid leadership position in the scrapbook and paper-based craft industry through its highly-recognized K&Company brand. Their product lines include albums, tag books, embossed stickers, metal arts, distinctive papers and three-dimensional Grand Adhesions. K&Company provides unique products and coordinating lines carefully designed for lasting appeal. Dimensions is a leading designer, producer and distributor of premium quality craft and hobby products for adults and children. It has developed leading brands including Dimensions® (needlecraft), Paintworks™ (paint-by-number), Perler Beads® (kids´ activity beading) and Inkadinkado® (rubber stamping). It also offers a large range of needlecraft options in cross-stitch, crewel embroidery, needlepoint, punch needle and embroidery