Industry Food processing Products Confectionery Founded 1925 | Fate Acquired by Nabisco Headquarters Cambridge Defunct 1963 | |
Owner James O. Welch (1906-1985) | ||
James O. Welch Company was an American confectionery manufacturer. James O. Welch (1906-1985) founded the company that bore his name in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1927. The company introduced many enduring brands, including Junior Mints, Sugar Daddys, and Sugar Babies. Other candies they produced were Welch's Fudge, Pom Poms, and Sugar Mamas.
James O. Welch Company was purchased by the National Biscuit Company (now Nabisco) in 1963. Welch acted as a director for Nabisco from 1963 until 1978, and his son, James O. Welch Jr. has been president of Nabisco. The Welch brands were sold to Warner-Lambert in 1988; Tootsie Roll Industries acquired them in 1993.
Following the collapse of his own confectionery company, the Oxford Candy Company, during the United States Great Depression James O. Welch's brother, Robert W. Welch, Jr., co-founder of the John Birch Society, joined the James O. Welch Company. He stayed with the company until 1956.