Inside a Christmas cracker making factory

Britons will pull 300 million crackers this year, although few realise that it is a home-grown tradition, invented by English confectioner, Tom Smith in 1847, whose first cracker creation was a paper wrapped bonbon sweet. Now Kim Lam, creative director of Celebration Crackers keeps the tradition alive by producing two million crackers a year, many of them rolled, tied and filled by hand, for supermarkets, office parties and luxury brands from Selfridges to Claridge’s hotel. Even the Queen is said to be a fan. Ms Lam tells Sarah Rainey what the Key to the perfect cracker joke is, “You don’t want anything too good -- it’s got to be a bad joke,“ she says. “You need something that gets the children giggling and has the grown-ups sitting round the table going, ’Uurrgghh...’“ Celebration Crackers has served a number of royals, and is this year sending truffle-filled crackers to Highgrove, the Prince of Wales’s estate. The Queen, meanwhile, is said to l