The candle factory in Vevey was becoming too small and Daniel Peter and his brother Julien are looking for a new location for their production.
North of he Vevey train station, an entire industrial district, « Les Bosquets », blossomed in the early 19th century. The water of the Monneresse canal as a hydraulic energy source and the railway line as a connection to the hinterland provide ideal conditions for production facilities at the time.
In 1861, Daniel Peter and his brother Julien acquired his first factory, where they initially continued to produce candles.
The brothers buy the former factory in the Bosquets district from the heirs of François-Louis Cailler. The competition is fierce, as other chocolate factories were also located in the region. However, a clause in the purchase contract prohibited the brothers from producing chocolate in their new factory for the first five years. Therefore, they continue to produce candles. In this industrial district, Henri Nestlé produced his famous “farine lactée” for children, and Louis Ormond produced his cigars.
Daniel and his brother Julien founded “Peter, Cailler and Co.” in 1867 to produce their own chocolate.
The widow Clément had already completely withdrawn from the business in 1866, the five years of the prohibition clause had passed, and Daniel and Julien Peter were now free to start production. Daniel quickly realized that chocolate had great potential as “a healthy and energy-rich food for the population”. In his view, a ready-made mixture based on real, nutritious milk would be much more practical. At that time milk was scarce in cities, difficult to preserve and often adulterated. However, everyone in the industry considered such a mix impossible. Thus began his quest for a revolutionary recipe…
Their neighbor in Rue de Bosquet is Henri Nestlé, is already producing his „farine lactée“ for children.
Nestlé's entrepreneurial spirit and his revolutionary invention inspire Daniel. The milk condenser that Henri Nestlé used to remove water from the milk gave Daniel the idea to stop trying in vain to mix cocoa with fresh milk. He also realizes that he needed to offer a ‘speciality’ alongside all other chocolate manufacturers to stand out from the competition and succeed.
After the death of his brother Julien in February 1869, Daniel ran the chocolate factory alone.
Then he devoted himself exclusively to chocolate production and the research for the '”magic” recipe for milk chocolate. The candle business is taken over and continued by his widowed sister-in-law.
In 1875, Daniel Peter began for the first time to mix cocoa with condensed milk to create a pleasantly sweet, long-lasting powder. Milk chocolate is born !
Several years of research and countless attempts were necessary. Daniel Peter recorder all his successes and failures in his secret notebook. One day he described in this way:
“It took countless unsuccessful attempts before I succeeded. It must be remembered that sterilization had not yet been invented. Sometimes I achieved a very satisfactory result in my mixing attempts, even though everyone said it was impossible, and I was overjoyed. But a few weeks later, when I examined the samples, I was greeted with the smell of bad cheese or rancid butter. I was desperate, but I didn’t give up. I continued to work as much and as hard as I could”.
