Yes, I know that in some places parts of the world it comes in more convetnional jars, and a plastic sqeeuze bottle is an option (if you have no class at all)

But why does it come in a little paint tin? what is the benefit to this design? while it clearly needs to be reseelable (if you are one of those people who uses less than a whole tin a time) But with every other foodstuff of it’s type the charactistic of resealability is achieved by putting it in a glass jar.

While I suspect that in all likelyhood it is still used becuase it is iconic, rather than becuase it is practical. But nevertheless it must have severed a practical fuction at some point.

Any ideas?

46 comments

  2. Tradition?

    It’s been around since 1885, back then most products similar to golden syrup came in similar containers since plastic resealable lids weren’t invented until some point in the mid-1900s.

  3. You’ve answered your own question; it’s iconic, and recognisable. It’s the worlds oldest unchanged branded packaging.

    If it ain’t broke …

  5. It was first produced 20 years before glass jars were commercially available. By then it had become established as part of the brand.

  9. Probabily something to do with the explodability of sugary stuff. Better to pop the lid off than explode a jar.

  11. You’d have a nightmare unscrewing the lid after a while if it was a jar. Honey in jars gets like this.

  12. I can’t say anything helpful about the tin, but wait until you notice that the label is literally of a dead, decomposing lion with bees hanging around it

    Edit: 7:20 in this clip (though the whole thing is an interesting watch)
    https://youtu.be/VkX3BsFuAug

  15. It’s so after you’ve finished you have a place to store assorted nails and spare hinges in your garden shed.

  16. Might just be my taste buds but the tin gives the syrup the tiniest tiniest metallic tang, making the flavour completely unique amongst other syrups?

  19. Condensed milk comes in tins too.

    Both easier to open and clean than a Bovril jar after it’s been used once though. Bovril can weld plastic and glass together more powerfully than any epoxy.

  23. So you have no questions about why their logo is a dead lion but want to know why it’s not in a glass jar?

  24. Shouldn’t the question be more about the dead lion covered in flies pictured prominently on the tin???

  26. It’s iconic and it’s fun to make an absolute frigging mess when trying to get some out. My Dad insisted on the tins and absolutely refused the squeeze bottles.

  28. Do you know, your right. Its a recycled varnish tin. For british people. We like shit like that. PRobably got some free added BITUMEN in it.

  29. Squeezey just isn’t the same, it’s not as thick, plus you don’t get the build up of crumbs that you do with a tin

  30. As well as the traditions mentioned. Especially in the case of treacle, its handy being in a container that you can put in hot water for 10 minutes to make it easier to pour.

  31. Birds custard used to come in those style of tins. It was supplied to the army during WW1 so I wonder if the tin had a practical benefit during that period?

  32. I bought one of the “squeezy” plastic bottles of it. Then worked out the price and now just buy the tins and top up the “Squeezy bottle for the convenience of squeezing all over my pancakes and the top of my porridge.

    Then store my spare varnish in the cleaned out (wi’tounge) tins.

  33. I presume because in the past it is what was used for many products like that. Most have switched to cheaper packaging like plastic, but because the tins are iconic for them it is still worth selling in that instead.

  35. I forget kids use reddit. Or teens. Some pretty brutal comments in here.

    Unless they’re an adult, then as you were 🤣

  37. Anyone else find they mark your wooden kitchen tops if there’s moisture around? Still preferable to plastic though.

  40. Fun fact T&L’s Golden Syrup has the oldest remaining original unaltered product branding in the world.

    They literally haven’t changed the way the tin/label looks since 1885.

    Kinda mad to think that if Queen Victoria had called for a tin of T&L syrup she’d have been handed a tin literally identical to the one you’d buy in a supermarket today.

  41. I use Golden Syrup every week to make oat and apricot cookies. I stand tin and a spoon in hot water so it’s easy and clean to measure if it was glass the label would come off naking a mess. The squeezy stuff does not taste or cook the same

  43. First because it’s the original packaging, so it’s distinctive to their brand. But from a practical perspective, the double ‘lip’ catches syrup and stops it from running down the side and making a mess.

  44. Tate’s Golden Syrup is the answer to a quiz question: – Which supermarket product has a depiction of a dead lion on it? You get an upvote from me if you know why it’s on the tin.

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