[1] In November 2020, it was announced that both the Gores Group and Premier Foods had sold their stakes in the business to British-based private equity firm Endless LLP.

The name was coined in 1890 by London student Herbert Grime in a national competition set by S. Fitton & Sons Ltd to find a trading name for their patent flour which was rich in wheat germ.

A 1926 advertisement widely deployed on the railways showed five such trains carrying headcodes H ō V I S along with an explanation (H-Hampton Court, ō-Hounslow, V-Kingston [V for Thames Valley], I-Dorking North & Effingham, and S-Shepperton).

[7] Filmed on Gold Hill in Shaftesbury, Dorset, Scott's advert has been voted Britain's favourite advertisement of all time.

[10] The boy on the bike, Carl Barlow, then aged 13, left acting and eventually became a firefighter in East Ham in 1979.

[8][12] In 2008 Hovis departed from the "boy on a bike" format by commissioning Go On Lad, a retrospective advertisement documenting the 122 years of British history since the brand's launch.

[14] In 1920 the company published Where to Go and How to Get There: Hovis Road Map of England, Wales and Scotland, and several versions of this book were later printed.