The wild story behind Tayto crisps - and how one 'accident' changed everything

Americans call them chips, Brits call them crisps — but here in Ireland, they’re known as Tayto. Tayto crisps are one of our most famous brands, as part of our culture as Guinness or Kerrygold butter.

Now a new book looks back over the 70-year history of the famous bag of cheese and onion. The Story of Tayto takes a look at the evolution of the crisp in a changing Ireland through the decades.

From the hand-packed paper packets to Mr Tayto’s election campaign and the rollercoaster of Tayto Park, it contains hundreds of images from the archives. It charts its humble beginnings in 1954, when Joe ‘Spud’ Murphy opened a small factory in Dublin city.

Until then, we imported out crisps from the UK, and Murphy embarked on the business when he saw the gap in the market. The Liberties man — who grew up in the shadow of the Guinness factory — started the company with a budget of £500.

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The then 30-year-old rustled together an array of tools and equipment, from second-hand bathtubs to donated vegetable slicers and washcloths, in order to get Tayto off the ground. The book tells how Joe sourced his potatoes from a man named Lightfoot at the Dublin Corporation Wholesale Markets near St Mary’s Abbey. He had to take two trips over and back to the market, as he was going through four sacks of potatoes daily.

The crisp factory opened its doors on March 26, 1954, with potatoes being washed in a bathtub and then fed into a slicer by hand, one at a time. And when it comes to the mouth watering taste for which the crisps are best known Joe claimed he ‘hit on cheese and onion by accident.’

He said in an interview at the time: “I had been doing a cheese flavour and an onion separately. One day I had too much onion flavouring ordered, and I got rid of it by mixing it in with the cheese.”

Scientist Seamus Burke — from Sligo — was the man who created the flavouring and the way to get it into the crisp. The cooked crisps were flavoured by hand and then packed into a waxed greaseproof paper bag before being sealed by another one of the company’s first employees, Bernie Kane.

In the 1950s and 60s, an advertising blitz led Tayto to become the national institution it is today. The book tells how Joe Murphy combined his ingenuity and engineering skills with a flair for publicity, to make Tayto part of the fabric of society. His approach to marketing ranged from attention-grabbing spectacles to humble community outreach projects.

In 1956, Joe commissioned the Neon Electric Sign Company of Talbot Street to make and install a neon sign that no visitor could avoid. For £70 per year, he rented a space along the side of the Lafayette Building, which stood in one of Dublin’s busiest and most photographed locations, towering over the south side of the O’Connell Bridge.

The glowing sign spanned four of the building’s six storeys and featured the company’s name in vertical lettering, with a neon Mr Tayto perched in the top left corner. It gave Tayto an unmissable 24/7 brand presence for the next 21 years, until Dublin City Council brought in tougher rules on public branding.

The Story Of Tayto is filled with images including a picture of the early factory floor with women hand packing boxes of crisps to years later when Mr Tayto can be seen alongside the Irish Men’s Football team. There are also pictures of the old crisp wrapper, which went from brown and orange in colour in its early days to its now iconic blue, red and white.

Even boyband Westlife can be seen showing their love for Tayto by posing at the height of their fame with a packet in their hands.

Tayto will donate €1 for every book sold to its charity partner, Alone, a national organisation that enables older people to age securely in their homes, and providing befriending services, advocacy and support.

Tayto northern vs southern - which crisp reigns supreme?

It’s the debate that divides the country: are Tayto crisps better in the south or north? There’s another version of Tayto in the North, which has the same name but is a completely separate brand — and came after the original. While ours is in the distinctive red, blue and white packet, northern Tayto is yellow and red.

It’s produced at Tandragee Castle in Co Armagh and tastes different. To Northies, the Tandragee Tayto is the best. They call our Taytos: “Free State-os.”

It all came about shortly after Joe ‘Spud’ Murphy started making the savoury snack in 1954. Another businessman in Armagh — Thomas Hutchinson — was wondering what to do with the 500-year-old Tandragee Castle he had just acquired. Hutchinson saw a gap in the market and so approached his crisp-making counterpart in Dublin.

He asked Spud to do a deal with him for the rights to the Tayto name as well as the unique recipe. So in 1956, he set up his factory in Tandragee.

Some love the flavour of the southern Tayto — such as Oasis frontman Liam Gallagher — while others, such as Hollywood actor Liam Neeson prefer the Northern version. Gallagher days they’re “the best crisps in the world”, while Neeson and superstar golfer Rory McIlroy swear by the Tandragee version whenever they’re back on the auld sod.

■ The Story of Tayto, left, by Bobby Aherne and published by Sitric Books, is available in bookstores nationwide priced €19.95.