** Tins of Taste Museum ** within NationalBreadMuseum.org

USA - Coca-Cola Cans 'n Tins
and a few other C-C items picked up through the decades

This database of Coca-Cola Cans 'n Tins is an ongoing work in progress. Following this initial posting to the Tins of Taste Museum, when there is an addition of an item, it will be noted here.

As our youngest was traveling with us around the country through his growing-up years, and gradually began international travels, by the time he was finished with college, I had no idea he had been picking up Coca-Cola cans (& a bottle when he was allowed to take it with him), until he told me to go see a shelf in his room one day after he had arranged a lineup! It was one shelf at that time. What a surprise. Through the years the cans have continued to accumulate from hither & yon😄🚗🌎✈🌍⛵🌏. If someone reading this begins such a collection, make sure you write the date & location on the bottom of each can or on a sticker. If you travel, pack a hard-core tube in your luggage (filled with snack bars or something you'll use up on the trip) so you're prepared to get an undented can(s) home.

Have you noticed all these changes through the years? We probably don't realize it until we see a "collection." Is it only with Coke, i.e., Coca-Cola? Whether Red, white, gold, silver, black, or tan, it's still recognizable as selling the same product❤.

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When you're going to Atlanta, Georgia, USA, put the Coca-Cola Museum on your list as one of the places to visit:

Before (glass) bottles, the only place you could buy a coke was at a soda fountain, served in a glass. In the 1950s-60s, you drank a "bottle of pop" or a "soda pop" - 10¢ - & maybe it was a 10 oz. bottle? - vs. 6-8 oz. In 1960-64, in the local high school town café, I'd make a "cherry coke" with a squirt of cherry syrup from a dispenser, & then fill the glass w/8 oz. of coke - 5¢. In 1969-70, a carry-case of 8, 16 oz. glass bottles of "soda" was $.99 on sale (returnable bottles).

A great time-line on the history of carbonated water-to-soda: https://www.thoughtco.com/introduction-to-soda-pop-1992433

**The Coca-Cola Tin World & Me!**

My tin collecting began when we got to live in Europe (husband in the USAF - England 1982-88 because of the SR-71 Blackbird). So many tins were used to package & sell tea (especially!), cookies (called biscuits), & candy, & then many were just empty (e.g., Ian Logan's yearly sales in London). Nevertheless, wherever we went I'd see a tin representing that historic store, a cultural identity (red phone booth, double decker bus, etc.), a castle or National Trust house, literature (Beatrix Potter of Peter Rabbit fame, Paddington Bear, Winnie the Pooh, etc.), old fashioned advertising, a historic event, & on & on. I figured the family could have a treat & & I'd have a souvenir for us!

By the time we moved to our next assignment (Germany 1988-91), I already had a collection of 400. (Really?!? Whew! That is a LOT of history.) Anyway, at an event on base called a bazaar, I met a vendor selling empty & new, old-fashioned/nostalgic-designed Coca-Cola tins (today they're "retro" or "vintage"), & it was a real challenge to pick & choose. So that's where the following Coca-Cola tins, made & sold by a French manufacturer, came from.

Then in the mid-1990s, back in the States, there was a nearby "1/2 Price Store." During a few years they sold tons (it seemed like) of new, old-fashioned-designed tins of all sorts of subject matter of the 1900s which I was familiar with: company names & product brands of dozens of outfits in the United States, some from England & other countries, subjects representing history - like ships, & so forth. This source also included a LOT of Coca-Cola tins for a while. My records show that a list of empty tins at "1/2 price" also came from a Shopko store. But after the Year 2000, I usually found only 1-2 "Santa Claus with Coca-Cola" tins here & there each year (Cracker Barrel, Hobby Lobby, Walmart, etc.). They usually had a deck of playing cards or ballpoint pens in them. Sometimes there'd be a nostalgic tin of advertising posters with a puzzle, but in time, there were none to be found.

Overall, from maybe the late 1980s & through the 1990s, there were many food companies which packaged some of their goods in great tins for the Christmas holiday season. It wasn't unusual to find at least 20-30+ tins of American products such as cookies, candy, crackers, & gum at Walmart's, Target, Big Lots, Shopko, K-Mart, etc. each year. I figured this might be a fad & gradually wind down by about 2010 with some other packaging becoming vogue, & sure enough, the majority of U.S. food companies aligned with the "tin market" until or through the turn of the century, since then have pretty much switched to various forms of paper, cardboard, or plastic.

Donna Kozak, Founder

NOTE: Tins are photo'd by the cover for the shape, & then the panels beginning with the seam on the left & turning the tin clockwise. When the bottom has no info, there is no photo. If there is some info on a label, some of the facts are usually noted. The (TOT #xxx) item in the info is only for museum indexing. It has absolutely nothing to do with any dating of the tin. The prices are what the tin cost. Dates are always the copyright date of that tin. So, let's begin!

Coca-Cola Tin Time - France!

Here are a few C-C tins from France in the Tins of Taste collection:

1989 - 1992

Coca-Cola Tin Time - USA!

Here are a few C-C tins from the USA that are in the Tins of Taste collection:

1993

1994

1995

2000

Coca-Cola Tins of an Unknown Date

On the back of this Santa Claus tin: From 1931 until 1964, artist, Haddon Sundblom created a painting of Santa Claus for The Coca-Cola Company every year. This COCA-COLA design was created in 1944 and the playing card images in 1945 and 1959. The legacy lives on with this COCA-COLA Tin and Playing Cards. (Written in English & French, & distributed in the USA & Canada.

Until this tin is out of storage, the photos didn't include the © date! There were at least 4 puzzles in this size of a tin during its time. The tin might be about 5"rd. x 7.5" high.