It’s hard to resist the temptation of chocolate over the Easter weekend, but one pharmacist’s commitment to preserving an Easter egg has seen it celebrate its 85th birthday. 

Wicker Pharmacy chair Martin Bennett shared a post on social media this weekend (April 18) with the intact egg captioned “the oldest Easter egg in captivity?” as he wished everyone a “happy Easter”. 

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The Easter egg’s longevity has even beaten Wicker Pharmacy’s own achievement of being open every day since 1952. 

The Easter egg has been kept in the Bennett family over three generations as it was originally bought by Bennett’s father Frank in March 1940 during World War II. 

“My grandmother had it and she said your dad bought me this when he first went in the army,” Bennett told C+D.  

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The pharmacist said his grandmother though it was “too beautiful to eat” and put it out at Easter every year. 

“What I’m amazed at is that it never melted,” said Bennett. “She used to put it on top of a telly, and it used to get quite hot in those days. Amazingly it’s still in one piece.”

After his grandmother died, the egg was passed back down to Frank and then onto Bennett when his father died. 

Read more: ‘Open every day since 1952’: Wicker Pharmacy celebrates 73 years 

Intriguingly, Bennett said the egg was produced by confectionary company Pascall who were set up in Australia in 1923 after originally opening in London in 1866. 

Bennett said: “It seems strange sending chocolate easter eggs from Australia to England. There was some link between that company and Cadbury’s. I did write to the company in Australia a few years ago, [asking] can you tell me anything about it. I never got a response back at all.” 

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Pascall had a factory with Cadbury and a base in New Zealand, with the company now owned by food manufacturer giants Mondelez International. 

In March, Wicker Pharmacy moved out of one of its premises in the hope it will save up to £60,000 a year to stay “sustainable”.