Winchcombe, Gloucestershire

Stick-ons: 3

I’ve been away for just over a week, hence the recent posts of pictures from my archives. Now I’m back, he’s a third stick-on sign, this time from the town where I live, to symbolize my return to the land where cups of tea are a way of life. These signs are on a window that until a while ago fronted a small grocery shop. The building is now used residentially, but the tea signs remain and add some colour to the rather sober window frame. They advertise two brands of tea that have been part of British life for over a century.

The Typhoo brand began in 1905 and was successful partly as a result of astute marketing – even in the 1900s the company produced teapots with the Typhoo name emblazoned across them and included collectable picture cards in packets of tea. In the early days the company also claimed their tea was health-giving, and the curious name derives from the Chinese for “doctor”.

Brooke Bond is even older. The company was founded by Arthur Brooke in 1869 and launched its famous P G Tips brand of tea in the 1930s. Brooke Bond tea was very successful from the 1950s onwards, when packets contained collectors’ cards that were probably even more popular than those given away with Typhoo tea earlier in the century. Brooke Bond tea is not widely sold in Britain now but the brand is still widely available in India and Pakistan.

I’m pleased these colourful signs are still adorning this former shop window. Whereas the Brooke Bond one sits quite neatly in its rectangle, the Typhoo sign has been cut up to fit – but in spite of the interrupting glazing bars its bold letters shout the message loud and clear.