Campbell’s Soup, Victor Records, and Dunder Mifflin: Camden NJs 3 Most Famous Firms

By: Graham Alexander

These days, Camden, New Jersey has a lot to celebrate about its present, future, and past. A commendation from Barack Obama about the restructuring of the police force and behavior during what were some of the most peaceful protests of the whole country in May of 2020, crime and violence rates falling precipitously year after year, new developments that are drawing international eyes on what was just a decade ago ‘America’s Most Dangerous City’… its safe to say Camden, NJ has seen *worse days*. Camden, New Jersey was - at one time - the center of many industries from music, to food, to shipbuilding, to steel pen manufacturing. Almost everyone in the world has heard of The Campbell’s Soup Company - the red and white can, the icon of the kitchen, an icon of pop art - the snowman melting commercial… There is a lot to celebrate about the fabled condensed soup company that was founded in Camden, NJ all the way back in 1869 and is still headquartered here.

Not too recently, The Victor Custom Shop made a custom Victor Victrola® Gramophone for Dorrance ‘Dodo’ Hamilton - the Billionaire Campbell’s Soup Company heir and philanthropist that passed away April of 2017. Of course, The Victor Talking Machine Company (Victor Records) - which was located across the street from the original Campbell’s Soup Plant (which was demolished in the 1990s) is another one of those fabled icons of industry; Victor invented the disk record, record player, modern stereo equipment, the music industry, synthesizer, ribbon microphone, modern speaker, modern tube amplifier, and of course Victor Records (the record label) and the iconic Victor Victrola® brand of home audio - which through The modern Victor Company has seen a large resurgence in recent years across the market. 

There is one company I’d argue might be the third most famous to ever originate from Camden, NJ: Dunder-Mifflin.

WHA? HUH? WHAT ARE YOU SAYING??

Yes, the largely fictional paper company from NBC’s ‘The Office’ (which famously focused most of its attention on the Dunder-Mifflin SCRANTON branch) was either founded - or opened one of its earliest offices in Camden, NJ. Unfortunately, I can only present the evidence that I have on hand for this; Dunder-Mifflin was founded in 1949 by Robert Dunder and Robert Mifflin and within several years was selling industrial brackets - not paper products. It is evident that based on the mid-century union strong manufacturing cities that are cited by the show as being offices of the company…early Dunder-Mifflin likely set up specifically in manufacturing cities in order to take advantage of supplying said industrial brackets - and later paper goods to what were once mid-century booming industrial cities like; Camden, NJ - Scranton, PA, -Albany, NY,  and Akron, OH, for example. During an interview with Robert Dunder, the company co-founder mentions an early business partner in the Dunder-Mifflin manufacturing business was a ‘South Jersey’ man - and Robert Mifflin a Philadelphia area man (Robert Dunder being from Scranton, PA).

Camden, NJ, it would seem - was looked down upon as a weaker performing branch of the company - it closes well before the Scranton Dunder Mifflin branch despite being considered a more stable branch in terms of personality. It is around this time that we learn ‘Dunder Mifflin Camden’ is ‘in a basement’ - so we can assume that keeping it open was either a losing proposition for a good period of time (possibly to appease the founders -whom we can assume might hold a sentimental feeling towards an early office of the company) OR - it faced a downturn due to its location in a post-industrial city with little to no major business presence in an era in which Dunder Mifflin Executives admit freely they are facing steep competition from Staples.

For me (and probably ONLY me), this is an ongoing labor of love - as a fan of The Office; and a fan of Camden, NJ area - I was pleasantly surprised to see our home city get the screen mention it deserves…even if that mention happens to be for hosting a badly failing mid-level regional paper company.

If you like this content, support Victor by visiting VictorRecords.com and signing up to our mailing list today! Join our historic movement for the future in taking back the music industry for the benefit of musicians and music fans everywhere