On one level this is just a nostalgia hit for people of a certain age, and not a young one, as this is from a mid-1970's colour supplement (I forgot to note which one/when), and the mid 1970's were, now, fifty years ago!
So which ones do you remember, these were all brands at the time, and the article makes clear there were more besides. Mex and Maxol are obviously sibling brands, while Sky and VIP look to be related. Some (six or seven, ten maybe, Mobil seem to have disappeared in the last decade or so, along with Chevron and Murco? Fina?) are still with us, with new ones like Q8 (Kuwait). We were a Shell family and had an account at the little garage on Phoenix Green, where they would come out in their khaki overalls and pump the fuel for us!
But this also helps illustrate a point I try to make from time to time . . . we all know the premiums issued by the bigger boys, even if, like National or Cleveland, they are no longer with us, because they were made in the sort of numbers where a fair amount survives; coin collecting albums (Shell and Esso), comic-book adverts for the promotion (Cleveland), surviving packaged examples (Jet), &etc.
But many of these would have issued some sort of incentive from time to time, and some of those would have been toys or collectables, which were never issued in the numbers to leave a trace, hell, half the above have no mention on the whole Internet!
But when things keep turning-up, like the 'Euro-premium' colours of Magic Roundabout figures, rather than our own Nabisco cereal premium colours, chances are they were issued by one of the above, or another, not illustrated above, or a smaller/regional ice-cream brand, or fleet of ice-cream vans, or even a regional chain of convenience stores, long since swallowed-up by the big-six?
Not generic, just lost! And what is the yellow disc one - CW?
Next day -
The link I mentioned in the comments is still there, it's changed appearance in the decade or more since I last looked, and has a legacy-page look to it now anyway, but a useful list and nostalgia read which also educates!
I recognize a lot of the ones that were here in the U.S. One I did not see was Sinclair, who used a green dinosaur as a logo.
ReplyDeleteI was driving through Yucca Valley a couple of weeks ago, and surprised to see an operating Sinclair gas station.
ReplyDeleteI knew of them through dinosaur toy premiums from the 60s, but always thought they were no longer in business.
Cheers guys, hence 'Sinclair dinosaurs'! Yes, I'm wondering if I may have passed a Fina in a smaller village recently, but I think it's more of a hopeful false memory, and it's funny how they just slip away, I guess because they are small, and get bought-up, the media doesn't bother with them?
ReplyDeleteThere used to be an excellent Blog-type web-page on all the old 'gasoline' companies, if I recall correctly he actually collected the original glass 'domes', but presumably also the plastic/fibreglass ones, but he listed other stuff, and it was an alphabetical list of all the petroleum companies from sort of 1900? I'll see if I can find the link, but it was 15-odd years ago, and Google's so shit for that kind of searching now.
H
My local petrol station is Fina, has been Burmah, Mobil and Q8 years ago too.
ReplyDeleteI vaguely remember Supermaggiore, Smurf advertising and freebies.
Texaco used to give away glassware I think, to the point where they were being turned down because people had cupboards full.
Little car kits from Jet?
I might have some brand loyalty if there were still some interesting freebies to collect!
J
I had a feeling Fina were still around Jon, I suspect that living in the M3/M4 corridor (an over-developed conurbation, albeit ribbon with green patches), the main brands have bought all the little-fella's, round here, but that some old village ones carry on in the depths of nowhere!
ReplyDeleteThe last littlie, was a two-pumper up on the Maultway in Camberley, but I guess it went . . . fifteen, or twenty years ago, funnily-enough, I think one of the pumps still had the Butler globe? But they would have been selling generic petrol, there's an outfit in the woods beyond Andover that do bulk home-fuel oil and generic petrol, probably pink-diesel too, from unmarked tankers?
Makes you feel old!
H