Gee Bee Pop

Not to be confused with the pop group, the Bee Gees (or their off-spin the Hee Bee Gee Bees), this is a brand of soft drinks that are better known in some parts of the country than others, but that has been around for a long time. Here we have the Bradford makers of a popular brand of fruit flavoured drinks in the 1980s associating their product with healthy exercise and the natural waters of Yorkshire, before showing the entire production process from fruit to supermarket shelf.

This is a further example of a promotional film made in the post-war decades by Bradford film producers C H Wood, who are better known for their many films of motor sports. Gee Bees became the brand name for what started out as George Barraclough's, with a factory on Cutler Heights Lane in Tyersal, Bradford, before moving further out to Westgate Hill. Barraclough's was taken over by the retail group Princes in 1991 (which had itself come under the giant Mitsubishi Corporation in 1989). There used to be many more makers of carbonated drinks in West Yorkshire, including Gomersal's "Magpie Minerals" near Morley, Thompson & Pearson from Bradford and Ben Shaws of Huddersfield – often delivering door to door.