New Cheshire Salt Works

The New Cheshire Salt Works Ltd was a salt manufacturer formerly located in Wincham, north east of Northwich in Cheshire, UK. Run by the Stubbs family, it operated between around 1923 and 2006. It produced white or brine salt from naturally occurring underground brine using natural or wild pumping. The salt was extracted by vacuum evaporation and was of a high quality. It was used for human consumption under the brandname "Selva" and in the pharmaceutical industry; New Cheshire was the only British company to supply salt for pharmaceutical use.

In its later years, New Cheshire was the biggest of the few remaining family-owned salt producers. From the mid-1980s until its closure, it was the only salt works in the UK still to use the natural brine pumping method.

After a rock salt bed was discovered north of Northwich in 1670, Northwich swiftly overtook Nantwich and Middlewich to become the largest salt producer in Cheshire. Mining began in the village of Marston in 1781, a few years after the opening of the North Staffordshire (later Trent and Mersey) Canal, which was used to transport the salt. In the 1850s salt works were established in Marston, and in the 1860s and 1870s in the adjacent village of Wincham, predominantly following the line of the canal. The Salt Branches Railway connected Wincham to Northwich from 1867. By the late 19th century, Wincham was a flourishing salt-manufacturing location, with several open-pan salt works as well as rock salt mines. Many of the salt works in Wincham were short lived, but some amalgamated to form Wincham Salt Works, which was located on the site of the New Cheshire Works in 1877. It was sold to the Salt Union in 1888, and demolished shortly afterwards.

The Stubbs family had a history in the Cheshire salt business dating back to the early 18th century, and had owned salt works near Northwich in the 19th century. The New Cheshire Salt Works was founded in 1922 or 1923 by Alfred Stubbs and other members of the Stubbs family, and remained in that family for five generations. The factory was in Wincham at SJ676754, to the north east of the Trent and Mersey Canal. It had two chimneys in red brick, one marked with their brand "Selva" in capitals. By 1982, New Cheshire was the only salt works remaining in Wincham, the nearby open-pan Sunbeam Salt Works having closed in the early 1970s.

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