Old oil companies (was: Re: WHDH-TV Weather 1959)

[Kevin Vahey]

Manchester, NH of all places was a test market for the Esso/Exxon switch.
The stations there re-branded a full year before it was rolled out.

In the early 60's I can recall that Standard Oil of Indiana called
themselves AMOCO in New England but in New York City there were AMERICAN.

I can also recall that my dad would drive out of his way to get Gulf back
then. Brand loyalty still meant something.


On Mon, Feb 27, 2012 at 1:03 AM, Garrett Wollman <wollman@bimajority.org>wrote:

> <<On Mon, 27 Feb 2012 00:13:36 -0500, A Joseph Ross <joe@attorneyross.com>
> said:
>
> > I also remember that in 1973, after the change over to Exxon in the
> > United States, I spent a week in London and found that the signs there
> > still said Esso.
>
> As indeed they still do to this day, in the UK and most other
> countries.  In some places, the brand is licensed to another oil
> company.  (In Canada, the trademark is owned by Imperial Oil, which is
> a majority-owned subsidiary of ExxonMobil, and one of the few
> remaining Canadian companies that still use the word "Imperial" in
> their formal names.  (The Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, better
> known as CIBC, is another.))
>
> The other Standard Oil companies were still vigorously maintaining
> their local "Standard" trademarks at that time and would not permit
> Standard of New Jersey to operate as "Esso" in their territories;
> Jersey Standard used the name "Enco" there, until they bought Humble
> Oil of Texas and rebranded everything "Exxon".  (The original
> "Standard Oil" companies doing business under the "Standard" name in
> this period were Jersey Standard; Standard of New York (Socony), which
> adopted the name Socony-Vacuum (Mobil) and the famous Pegasus logo
> when it acquired competitor Vacuum Oil Co.; Kentucky Standard (KySO),
> which was acquired by Standard of California (CalSO) and with it
> became Chevron; Standard of Ohio (SOHIO); and Standard of Indiana,
> which acquired American Oil Co. and became Amoco.  Standard of
> Louisiana (STANOCOLA) was acquired by Jersey Standard early on and was
> already operating under the Esso name.  Various other retailers were
> also part of the Standard Oil Trust, but never operated under the
> Standard name.)
>
> All of these companies maintained at least one retailer in each state
> using the name "Standard", in some cases long after the name had been
> ceded to the history books -- Scott and I stopped by the (Amoco)
> Standard station in Iowa not long before it became a BP back in 2001.
> In some cases, the name they eventually adopted, like Chevron and I
> believe Amoco, was first used in territories where they could not use
> "Standard".  However, SOHIO used the name BORON outside of Ohio (it
> had no other "home" territory, unlike the others) until they were all
> rebranded as BP (which the company would like to remind you definitely
> does not stand for "Anglo-Persian Oil Company" or even "British
> Petroleum" any more).
>
> -GAWollman
>
>