Establishment The Sugar Refineries Company or Sugar Trust was incorporated in late 1887, with
Henry Osborne Havemeyer as president. Sugar Trust was forced to reorganize after the
Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 outlawed
trusts that formed
monopolies, such as the Sugar Trust. The ASR was incorporated in
Jersey City, New Jersey on January 10, 1891 by Henry Osborne Havemeyer, with $50 million in capital. By 1907, it owned or controlled 98% of the sugar processing capacity in the United States. The
United States Supreme Court declared in
United States v. E. C. Knight Company (1895) that its purchase of the stock of competitors was not a combination in
restraint of trade. By 1901, the company had $90 million in capital. which was accused of having secured favorable tariff legislation by corrupt means. American Sugar opposed free trade with Cuba in order to maintain tariff protections for processed sugar, while pushing for privileged importation of raw sugar. By 1929, the company was producing over a fifth of the refined sugar consumed in the United States, at five refineries processing sugar from Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Philippines and Louisiana. In Cuba it owned 500 square miles of land, 191 miles of railroad, and two factories producing 600 million pounds of raw sugar annually.
Philadelphia,
Baltimore,
Chalmette, Louisiana; and
Spreckels, California.
Name change In the early 1970s, the company made major investments in
high-fructose corn syrup production, and changed its name to
Amstar Corporation (ASR). It moved its headquarters from
120 Wall Street to
1251 Avenue of the Americas in
Midtown Manhattan. In 1975, Amstar sued pizza chain
Domino's Pizza for
trademark infringement; Amstar won at trial but lost on appeal. With investments in food-picking and handling machinery companies in the
Midwestern United States, the company faced a takeover by the British sugar company
Tate & Lyle in 1980. How long this lasted is uncertain. Amstar was acquired by
Kohlberg Kravis Roberts in 1983; KKR sold Amstar to
Merrill Lynch three years later. Domino Sugar was acquired by British company
Tate & Lyle in 1988.
Takeover In 2001, Domino Sugar officially changed its name to Domino Foods, Inc. that was closed on November 6, 2001. Privately held American Sugar Refining is owned by the Florida Crystals Corporation company, part of FLO-SUN, a sugar empire of
the Fanjul Brothers whose origins are traced to Spanish-Cuban sugar plantations of the early 19th century. American Sugar Refining also owns two of its former significant competitors,
C&H Sugar (California and Hawaii), purchased in 2005, and Jack Frost (
National Sugar Company). ==See also==