Having picked the right side in the Dinky Stadden/Cameron debate the other day, I'm going to chance my arm and say I think these are sculpted by the same chap who did SEGOM's figures, but I'm probably wrong! These Napoleonic premiums are all much of a muchness, whether, Storm, Starlux or Mokerex, that is; standing in a non-combatant pose, legs together, best parade finery to the fore!
Adrian (Mercator Trading) had these at the Plastic Warrior show and he might still have a few if you get in touch through his website, but not all the poses as they were selling like hot cakes! All the standard-bearers had gone by 11am!
A lot of people showed an interest in them and we kept trying to read the name on the bases, being a myopic crowd of a certain age-group and being convinced they must be a French premium, we were reading Laverer, Lavaere, Belever etc...! It was only when I got them home and photographed them could it be seen they are a thoroughly British sounding 'Beverly'.
This is not to say they are British, but there is absolutely nothing on them on the Net, I tried all the usuals; Vintage/ British/Giveaway/Soap/Washing Powder/Premiums etc...and if they turn-up near mint in Britain you feel they must have been premiums here? Also they are a soft ethylene polymer and most French issues of this type of thing are cellulose or polystyrene?
They look like they could have also been issued with German margarine, French coffee, Portuguese soap-powder, Spanish Sobres and Belgian sweets, so they may well turn up with other monikers on the base. I'm sure they originate in France though, I'm not saying they are that British.
Can anyone add anything to this? All my books are in the storage unit...did Garrett, Rose or Harris mention them? Have you got some with another mark on the base? Other colours? Who or what were/was/is Beverly?
Update - 3rd June 2013
Update - 24th November 2014
It seems it (Beverly) was a sparkling, non-alcoholic, bitter aperitif, available in Italy between 1969-2000. The company was part of or a wholy owned subsidiary of Coca-cola, and there is still the possibility of tasting it at Coca-cola world and at Disney's Epcot Centre, where various other Coke brands from around the world are available. There were two versions, a clear drink and a redish-orange fruit-flavoured version.
Up against more established brands such as Campari it was only ever an 'also-ran' and for now i must assume these figures were part of a promotion to try and raise the profile of a drink which those now indulging in deliberate over-indulgence videos on Youtube would have us believe is pretty vile!
8 comments:
well, I am not sure if it helps but I do have my copy of Garratt to hand and he names SEGOMs later sculptor as Peter BIEVILLE.
A coincidence, non?
No Beverley though.
Hi John...
It's enough to prick your ears up and start a myth!!
Thanks for that...it's funny, I didn't mention it on the post but one of the longer conversations with customers as they picked out a set, was that A) SEGOM's widow/daughter (?) is selling metal casts of both the 54mm and 25mm on French eVilBay all the time, and B) these seem brand new...could it be that they are SEGOM's moulds? And quite recent? I think if they were the collecting fraternity would know about them...so unlikely, but food for thought!
Cheers
Hugh
(PS, good to see you blogging again the other night...more Eriksson's? I need my fix!
H)
Hi Hugh
These were originally issued by "Imperial" (makers of desserts - flan) as premiums in the 1960's, they were copied by "Beverly" (don't know what they made but margarine has been suggested) and 7 of them were copied slightly smaller by CRIO (soap) along with 7 others. Later the moulds were obtained by COFALU who issued them factory painted.
They are on Le Ludoprimophiles site here:
http://planete-figurines.pagesperso-orange.fr/accueilempire.htm
he suggests they were made by ACEDO (Domage et Cie) but I have found nothing to substantiate this.
Best wishes, Brian
Cheers Brian
I have Imperial listed, but only for flats! That link is dead, I don't know if it's just my PC, but I couldn't find much on his site a while ago, so maybe he's sort of given it up?
It hadn't been updated for a while and was always a bit difficult to navigate/load. I have downloaded the pages on those other two in the past, they look to be hard plastic though?
But still nothing on Beverly!
Hugh
Hi Hugh, the Ludoprimophile site is still up but I had to update my Javascript to access it, also virus scan dosen't seem to like it, so that might be the problem. Beverly are mentioned in J C Pifrett's book Figurines Publicitaires but he dosen't say what they made.
Brian
Ah, I did get a couple of 'your thingy needs updateing' messages on other sites last night, I thought it was spammy stuff and ignored it! Then I lost internet anyway (I'm knocking this out at work, but I came back from lunch early so fell it's justifiable!).
I'll sort it all out this evening when I've topped-up. The French Premium book is very good (but currently in storage again) and I could remember some similar figures in it but nothing quite the same.
Would you concour on the other issues looking to be a hard/styrene plastic?
Hugh
Hi Hugh, just been up to take a look at my stuff, I have hard white plastic factory painted by Cofalu. Hard white plastic and soft red & blue plastic all unmarked which I have always assumed to be Imperial. Hard white plastic marked Crio (which are very different in any case) but none marked Beverly. I'll leave you to figure out what you can from this.
All the best Brian
Cheers Brian
They looked hard, still the search goes on!!
H
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