1950’s Esso Tiger Advertising Statue “Put a Tiger In Your Tank”
These pictures and video are of the Esso Tiger we restored a few years back and that still guards the Retroplanet.com world headquarters. The pictures show the ‘before’, ‘during’ and ‘after’ stages. At Vintage Vending we restored 3 of these over the years. This one is the smaller of the two sizes that were used by Esso, and is different then most Tigers because of the embossed Esso logo on the back leg.
The Tiger is fiberglass so the restoration process entailed stripping the old paint, fiberglass repair work, primer, sanding, a basecoat of paint, airbrushing the details and then clear coat to finish.
Here are a couple of tips if you decide to restore one.
1. If you sandblast—be very careful. Use a media that is not that abrasive; you do not want to break through that outer layer of fiberglass. I believe we used crushed walnut shells.
2. Also, do your best to find one with its tail. Many are missing theirs and they’re not the easiest things to duplicate.
All in all, it is not a hard restoration, especially if you have access to a good airbrush artist. Good luck.
5 responses so far ↓
1 nicole vinette // Nov 20, 2008 at 11:34 am
A major sponsor of Hockey Night Hockey during The Original Six era had a car related commercial. Someone driving in to a gas station with a specific car problem. I am looking for a one word answer to the specific problem. I assume it was an Esso commercial. I was pretty young at that time. Can you help? please and thanks
2 Bill // Jun 23, 2009 at 10:58 pm
Hello
i have just acquired one of these tiger statues. I was wondering how much i could sell it for? It is in decent shape.
Thanks
3 vintagevending // Jun 24, 2009 at 9:07 am
Bill,
We aren’t able to give estimates on the value of an item. If you keep an eye on Ebay or Craig’s List, your item is sure to be listed at some point. That may give you a rough idea of it’s value but keep in mind prices vary greatly depending on condition. If anyone can help with a value of this item please comment.
4 Glenn // Sep 20, 2009 at 3:02 am
The “Put a Tiger in Your Tank” campaign dates from ca. 1964, if I’m not mistaken. I remember the commercials, and my dad picked up white hooded sweatshirts from an Esso station for us kids, with the Esso Tiger’s head on the front, and his tail on the back.
5 Peter Williams // Feb 6, 2010 at 10:48 pm
Interesting page ! . . . would like to find more Esso or Exxon Tiger advertising material from that classic marketing time, anything, stickers, logos, slogans, merchandise . .
Peter_W
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