Endearing stork courting rituals

A lorry carrying Stork margarine overturned on the A531 in Staffordshire, UK, when Britain and its allies were fighting Hitler’s Germany in the Second World War.

Food was rationed at the time and looters carried off the truck’s contents. The location is still called ‘margarine corner’.

The accident was a godsend for Unilever. The unauthorised free handout helped remove anxieties about the health effects of eating what was then a relatively new-fangled product. The stork is the bringer of babies; using it as a logo helped allay such fears.