Race to the Pole on BBC 2

Some time back a company called KEO films contacted me to say "was I aware that a company called Cooper & Co. had supplied tea to the Scott expedition way back in 1911." They had an inventory of all the suppliers, and our company name appeared on it.

They were organising a re-run of the famous race between Scott and Amundsen using the food and equipment of the time; could we once again supply the tea?

My initial reaction was to be very sceptical, however they subsequently sent further details which stated that a company called Cooper, Cooper & Co. based in London had in fact been the suppliers. They no longer existed and we were the only Cooper & Co. nationwide who went back that far and seemingly were the only link.

The early years of our company are extremely hazey, however we do appear in an advertisement on the front page of the first edition of the local Jersey Evening Post back in 1890, so we know that we existed at that time but sadly nobody knows where the name Cooper came from; we could well have been part of a larger organisation as the Cooper name appears around the UK in places like Liverpool and Bristol in connection with Tea and Coffee. Sadly all of these businesses have since closed.

Anyway to cut a long story short we supplied 20 kilos of English Breakfast tea to the expedition, however were unable to change the historical result. The Norwegians won the rematch once again with their faster dogs and no matter how much tea they drank the British team still couldn't even get close!