The Walrus Manufacturing Company of Decatur, Illinois was one of the many manufacturers that tried to cash-in on the ongoing soft drink craze in the early 1900s. This advertisement is from the “National Bottlers Gazette”. Walrus, like other manufacturers, was marketing their product directly to bottlers in the hope that they could become their cooler [...]

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These are a series of ads for Arnold Bottle Chest Coolers. These were manufactured by G. J. Arnold Bottlers’ Supplies Co. in the late 1930s and early 1940s. They must be quite rare, as I was only able to locate one source that even knew about the Arnold coolers: in the book titled “Classic Soda [...]

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Vendo was founded in 1937 in Kansas City, Missouri. Their initial product line consisted of chest coolers, but after WWII they became known for their upright vending machines, which were made exclusively for the Coca-Cola Company. This chest cooler is one of the earliest—if not one of the first chest coolers made by Vendo.
This [...]

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This is an eye-catching cooler manufactured for dispensing and promoting the sales of Coca-Cola in bottles and cans. It was manufactured in the 1960s by the Beverage-Air Company of South Carolina. It has a very large capacity, with 12 display racks. There are two glass doors that open to provide access to the cold the [...]

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This is a little German Coca-Cola picnic cooler that we restored. It was small—about the size of a Progress airline cooler and able to hold about 6 bottles. Unlike the Progress cooler, the lid comes completely off and there are no hinges. “Trink Eiskalt” translates as you might guess, to “Drink Cold”. We’re unsure of [...]

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This Progress A1 picnic cooler is referred to as the “tall” version. It shares the same dimensions in width and length as the smaller A1 coolers, but this model is 2 ½ inches taller. It has a 38-bottle capacity and is embossed with the Red Rock Cola brand. Red Rock was a soda brand founded [...]

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