Hershey: The Real Life Willy Wonka

Hershey's is one of the biggest chocolate companies in the world, worth nearly $47 billion dollars. And yet, the Hershey Company was founded by a boy who struggled through poverty and went bankrupt multiple times. This is the true rags to riches story of a chocolate empire - this is the insane and inspiring story of Milton Hershey.

Milton Hershey’s early life was difficult to say the least. He was born in 1857 in a rural dairy farming community called Derry Township, in Pennsylvania. Whilst Milton’s parents both came from respectable families, Milton’s father Henry, had a bad habit of falling for shady get-rich-quick-schemes.

You see, Henry had always been determined to succeed in business, but he would rarely stick to any of the projects he started. He tried and failed 17 different businesses before moving the family to Oil City, Pennsylvania - and they only moved there because he was trying to get rich on a recent oil boom, but they arrived when it was already too late to make any money.

Milton was just 4 years old at the time, and his father’s poor financial decisions meant the Hershey family had almost completely run out of money - in fact young Milton was extremely skinny and on the brink of starvation.

This is the story of Milton Hershey and the Hershey Company - including Hershey's caramel business, Hershey's chocolate business, and Hershey's philanthropy. It's an inspiring entrepreneurial business success story with business and investment / money lessons for all of us about building wealth.