Weet-Bix

“Aussie kids are Weet-Bix kids” – Sanitarium’s Slogan

Weet-Bix is a wholegrain cereal that is shaped like a thin brick, known as a ‘wheat biscuit’, that is made by Australia’s Sanitarium Health Food Company and South Africa’s Bokomo.
The forerunner of Weet-bix were known as ‘Granose biscuits’, which were first made by the famous Kellogg brothers in the 1890s in the USA, and in 1899 they were being produced in Australia by the Sanitarium Health Food Company, and became popular during World War I where they were being fed to the troops.
Grain Products Limited was established by Arthur Shannon in the mid 1920s to make wheat biscuits known as ‘Weet-Bix’, in competition to the Sanitarium Health Food Company’s Granose biscuits, and a newly formed company known as Cereal Foods that produced a sweeter wheat biscuit known as ‘Vita-Brits’.
Weet-Bix are a good source of fibre and are high in folate and thiamin, and are generally eaten for breakfast covered in milk.
Weet-Bix is a common food icon of Australia and New Zealand, and has become the two countries’ most popular cereal.

In the 1920s, Bennison Osborne, Norman Jeffes, Frederick Foots and Arthur Shannon all contributed to the new Grain Products Limited wheat biscuit, known as ‘Weet-Bix’, which became a quick success, although in 1928 the company was sold to the Sanitarium Health Food Company, who were buying out their competitors.
Australian soldiers ate Weet-Bix for breakfast during World War II, and the product sponsors some Australian sport teams and their players, such as cricket and soccer teams, which often appear on Sanitarium’s advertisements.
Australians eat approximately 1.4 billion Weet-Bix each year, and in 2010, the amount of Weet-Bix manufactured would’ve been enough to cover a soccer field up to 18 metres (59 feet) high.
Bennison Osborne and Ian Malcolm Macfarlane, who was also involved in the Grain Products Limited company, eventually moved to England and started a company called the British and African Cereal Company Pty Ltd, with their main product being a modified version of Weet-bix, known as ‘Weetabix’, which have become popular in a number of countries around the world.
Originally, Weet-Bix were delivered to shops by horse and cart, and some years later, they often had collectible cards included in the box.

Fishpond: