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A visitor to Cowick Hall in Snaith, East Yorkshire this week, I found myself marking a centenary that was both personal and globally significant. Like many locals, I’d known of the business based at the hall, Croda International — a quiet presence in the background of my early career in nearby Howden. I married into a Goole family; our best man’s father worked at Croda, and his godfather, Edgar Lower, was the company’s first Technical Director. Little did I know then that Croda would become one of Yorkshire’s most quietly powerful exports — a business that touches billions of lives, without ever really shouting about it.
Cowick Hall Centenary exhibit
Circular Beginnings, Smart Growth
Founded in 1925 by a money man, Mr Crowe, and an ideas man, Mr Dawe — hence the name — Croda began by extracting lanolin from wool grease. Turning a waste product into something valuable. A century later, that circular economy mindset feels surprisingly modern. The company’s strapline, “Smart science to improve lives” — introduced in 2018 and crafted by one of its own employees — captures a forward-looking purpose that still feels remarkably current.
Global Reach, Yorkshire Roots
Croda International Plc Headquarters at Cowick Hall
Croda now operates 42 manufacturing sites, 38 innovation centres and 72 sales offices, with over 6,000 employees across the globe. More than 97% of its sales are generated outside the UK. And yet, Cowick Hall remains its HQ — not out of necessity, but continuity.
Group Chief Executive Steve Foots joined Croda in 1990 as a graduate trainee. “I met the two most important partners in my life at York University: my wife and my employer,” he told me with a grin.
CEO, Steve Foots
Raised in the North East, based in Yorkshire ever since, Foots’ journey through the business — from sales to CEO in 2012 — is emblematic of a company that values people and plays the long game.
His mantra is: “IQ is important, but so is EQ.” Strategy matters. But culture delivers.
In a new report marking the centenary, Navigating the Future of Innovative Ingredients, Foots writes: “The successes of the past, the progress being made in the present, and our potential for the future all stem from the incredible intellect, passion and dedication of individuals who have made this company what it is today… Without this cadre of exceptional people, this century of achievement would have been impossible.”
The founders may have been Yorkshire men, but as Foots says: “While many people think of Croda as a Yorkshire business, it really isn’t any more.”
And yet, that Yorkshire mindset — head down, get on with it — is still in the company’s cultural DNA.
A Tour Through Innovation
At the centenary event, guests were divided into rotating groups, exploring themed stations focused on Innovation, Globalisation, and Sustainability. In the Applications Labs, scientists demonstrated how Croda’s ingredients support everything from wrinkle creams to crop protection and vaccine delivery.
Standout sessions: the work of Dr Finn Bauer, VP Research & Development, Croda Life Sciences, showcasing Croda’s speciality pharmaceutical excipients, stabilising increasingly complex drug molecules. Elsewhere, VP R&D Consumer Care, Dr Andy Butterworth and Holly Jones, Market Applications Specialist, Personal Care, talked skincare science.
Cowick Innovation Centre scientists demonstration
In the Crop Lab, James Hunt, Global Strategy Director, showed how Croda’s ingredients help soil retain water — a quiet answer to a very big question.
It was an accelerated innovation timeline. But the underlying message was clear: Croda builds long-term value by solving real-world problems.
Quiet Revolutions
This isn’t a company built on hype. But its impact is everywhere.
In the 1990s, Croda acquired Sederma, the French company behind Matrixyl — a now-legendary skincare ingredient that brought anti-ageing science to everyday bathrooms. Peptides, ceramides, liposomes — once niche terms, now familiar fixtures.
Former CTO Keith Layden
Then came Lorenzo’s Oil. The true story that inspired the Hollywood film also marked the beginning of Croda Pharma. As former CTO Keith Layden recounts, a small team in Hull and Leek helped manufacture a compound that improved the lives of children with ALD. That work led to nutritional lipids, super-refining technology, and eventually lipid systems used in mRNA Covid-19 vaccines.
“We helped to protect billions of lives globally,” says Layden.
Sustainability as Strategy
What sets Croda apart isn’t just clever chemistry. It’s the belief that sustainability isn’t a cost — it’s a competitive edge.
Chief Sustainabiliy Officer, Phil Ruxton
Chief Sustainability Officer Phil Ruxton talked about impact through value chains and helping customers build net-zero ready portfolios. Croda’s teams don’t just make products greener — they push their already best-in-class ingredients further. “We’re always asking, how can we improve it again?” said one researcher over lunch.
This year, new sites in India, China and the US will open — built to serve local markets, not just cut costs. The India site will be net-zero from day one. It’s a model that makes Croda more resilient, less dependent on globalised supply chains, and more relevant to the regions it serves.
A Yorkshire Story — But Not Only Yorkshire’s
The celebration at Cowick Hall wasn’t a showy brand exercise. It was a reunion. Retirees, scientists, investors and global partners all came together not to bask in nostalgia, but to talk about the next chapter.
And perhaps that’s the secret. Croda doesn’t claim the spotlight. It doesn’t need to. Its work is in the chemistry behind the creams, the coatings on the seeds, the molecules in the medicines. A business built on smart science, solving problems quietly, and sticking around.
As Steve Foots wrote in the centenary book: “Fasten your seat belts… that was just the first part of the journey.”
Quietly brilliant. Still moving forward.
Guests gathered outside Cowick Hall
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