Argentina-Bovril farmed 1.5 million head of cattle in 1910.

ARGENTINA.

BOVRIL ESTATES ARGENTINA, FARMED 1.5 MILLION CATTLE IN 191O.

Bovril used to have the largest neon sign, in Piccadilly Circus London just one word saying Bovril, the sign took pride of place for over 70 years.

They also advertised on over 500 London Double Decker red buses.

In 1888 Bovril was sold in over 3000 pubs and shops in England, today is sold all over the world.


The beef extract was first commissioned by Napoleon 111 in 1870, as he claimed his men could not march on empty stomachs.

He commission a Scottish chemist named John Lawson Johnson, to come up with a recipe, giving him an advance order and cash for one million tins of the product.

Lawson could not get sufficient cattle in England so went to Argentina, where the Liebig family were already involved in beef extract business with Oxo and Fray Bentos.

Lawson teamed up with one Eustaquio de la Riestra, who had a beef plant and was killing cattle for the hides and salting the beef, in Entre Rios.

This was the start of the Argentine Bovril Estates Ltd, who were slaughtering 10,000 cattle per week at the end of the nineteenth century.

In 1910 they had farms that were half the size of England and a herd of 1..5 million cattle.

They opened La Plata Cold Storage Company in 1910, which sold out to Swifts in 1916, however the family retained the trade mark of Bovril and continued with the extract.


Bovril today is distributed by Unilever and produced in Burton on Trent in England.

Since 2004 they have used no beef in the extract, after the problems with BSE, the Moslem world wanting Halal beef, while the Jewish world want Kosher beef.

So Bovril today, is made from yeast extract the same as Vegemite in Australia and Marmite in the UK.

Bovril when it was a beef extract, held the distinction of having Papal approval from the Vatican.

There was an advertising campaign in the early 20 th Century, run in Great Britain, that depicted the Pope seated on his throne, bearing a mug of Bovril and the campaign slogan ran "The Two Infallible Powers-The Pope and Bovril" its hard to imagine what a coup that was.

Today the town of Bovril, still exists in Argentina, in the province of Entre Rios and has a population of 9,000.Alas the beef plant is no longer there.

When John Lawson Johnson died, the business of extract was taken over by his son George Lawson Johnson, who in 1929 became Lord Luke.