Posted by RedMF40 on September 20, 2018 at 19:41:52 from (172.58.185.238):
I would tack this on to the other post, but folks seem to be sensitive about "hijacking" a subject. Me--I'd rather someone hijack my post because usually what I had to say wasn't that interesting to begin with ;-)
Here goes:
Years ago I read a history of the Coke company. It was pretty well-researched, one of the more interesting reads—and it helped that I was really into Coca-Cola back then. One interesting fact stayed with me: At the time that Coke was becoming popular—end of the 1800s to the early twentieth century, you had to buy it at a soda fountain or pharmacy—or, as was often the case—they were one and the same. You sipped a glass of Coke and passed the time of day with friends maybe.
Then one day two enterprising men approached who was then the president of Coca-Cola. Sorry, his name escapes me, been a long time. These two men wanted the rights to bottle the stuff and then sell the bottled Coke in stores. People could bring it home with them. The chief of Coca-Cola thought the idea ludicrous—who would want to do that? But he went along with the idea, probably since it meant more sales of the coke ingredients—principally the syrup needed to mix with soda water. He sold them the rights for a pittance, since he saw no future in it.
Early on, local families in small towns embraced the idea of these two men, and bought into it. Almost literally, they became millionaires overnight. When you drive through small-town America and see the Coke bottling facilities, many of them are in the same family that started them all those years ago. Hard to let go of a good thing.
I recall a town in Missouri—it was either Springfield or Jefferson—and they’d just stopped production of the little green bottles. It was in the papers, and my wife and I were driving cross-country. I insisted we stop in and visit the bottling facility. The man there showed us the ancient machinery, dating back to the 1920s. Only one man there could keep it all going, and that man had just retired, long after he should have stopped working. No one could really figure how to maintain the machinery and keep it functioning, so they stopped production. I’m sure there were other reasons as well, but that’s the one he gave us. They sold out of every last green bottle, but the manager generously offered us two bottles of Sprite in the bottles that were popular in the 1960s.
My remaining piece of Coke memorabilia is a working 1960s-era Coke machine with the bottles lined up on the left, behind a glass door. I remember a few of these still around when I was growing up. This one has the price of 15 cents still on it, and the coin mechanism and refrigerator still work. I can put different-size bottles in it, since it’s set up that way—so you can put in the beer and soda bottles of today. I haven’t tried the plastic coke bottles, feel that it would be too un-authentic.
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