Wedgwood’s creamware was an instant success, bought by the expanding middle class of Britain, its colonies and the Continent. It also appealed to Queen Charlotte, who was so pleased with the tea service she ordered from Wedgwood that she allowed him to rename it Queen’s Ware and to style himself ‘Potter to Her Majesty.’

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Creamware made Wedgwood rich and famous, but another of his accomplishments, the building of the Trent & Mersey Canal, benefited all of Staffordshire. Wedgwood raised subscriptions that helped to pay for the canal and garnered political support to ensure it ran through the potteries. Completed in 1777, the canal brought raw materials into the area and finished goods out. It reduced by 90 percent the cost of the coal that fired local furnaces and all but ended the breakage of goods, which had been high when wares were transported by packhorse on unpaved local roads.

Wedgwood was also quick to try machinery that would improve his wares or speed their production. Pioneering the use of engine-turning lathes and finely balanced throwing wheels, Wedgwood produced some of the finest ceramics in England. He also adopted new sources of power, such as windmills and steam engines.Power is necessary to grind the flints and mix the clays that compose ceramic bodies. In the 17th century, this work was done by water mills, but by the 1770s, many potters were also using wind power. Between 1782 and 1793, Josiah Wedgwood installed several of James Watt’s rotative steam engines, making him an earlier user of the machine than the Lancashire cotton industry.

During the decades that followed, the Staffordshire potteries became increasingly mechanized. The owners, like most early English industrialists, followed Wedgwood’s model: They started small, making incremental changes that required only modest outside financing, usually from family and friends and rarely from banks or other capital-raising institutions. Thus factories grew gradually and naturally, without guidance or interference from banks or the state.

The potteries expanded in size and complexity, so that by 1785 Staffordshire’s 200 pottery manufacturers employed 20,000 workers. Matthew Boulton — a metalworker and highly successful producer of steam engines — showed how to do so efficiently. In his factory of more than 600 workers, each well-disciplined employee performed a single task. Operations were smooth and highly profitable.

Wedgwood admired Boulton’s factory and introduced its principles in his own establishment. By assigning each of his workers one activity in a given place, rather than allowing employees to go from spot to spot performing various functions, he increased productivity dramatically. Teaching an unskilled laborer one task was much easier than turning him or her into a master potter. Specialization also eliminated the time lost in moving between activities. Moreover, it promoted product uniformity and prevented workers from learning the secrets of his ceramic glazes and bodies and passing them on to competitors.

Specialization, however, also necessitated a new management structure. Master potters no longer oversaw the work of journeymen and apprentices. Instead, Wedgwood employed managers and foremen to ensure that work was performed well. He also recognized the need for specialization off the shop floor and often had a partner or associate who could handle his business in London or advise him in matters of taste and style.

Business was good, and the output of the Staffordshire potteries increased fivefold between 1725 and 1777. Markets for what are now called ‘consumer goods’ were steadily growing.

English families with skills or capital were enjoying a rapidly rising standard of living. Throughout the 18th century, the size and economic power of the middle class grew, as opportunities increased for people to earn a living away from the land. Middle class and even artisan families became a hungry market for the textile industry and makers of household items such as pottery. They particularly liked Wedgwood’s creamware, which cost less than fine porcelain but was more refined and durable than other English earthenware.

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