Billboard reefers

[memsd]

Those old wood reefers with the big displays on the sides... Was that identifying the cargo or was it just paid advertisement? Curious minds...

[Anonymous]

I believe the simple answer is "yes". They were originally done for advertising, but it was possible that the product advertised was being transported inside, if it required refrigeration. I have an "Old Dutch cleaner" reefer, which I doubt ever hauled Old Dutch.

Andrew

[Eriediamond]

The old bilboard cars were origially biult or leased by companies to haul their products and to advertise. However, there were law suits filed because other products were hauled in them as well and some times a direct competitors product . They were neat while they lasted though.

[lupo]

another question about those billboard cars:
when where the around, and for how long?
LupO

[coalminer3]

IIRC, they were around until abt. 1930.

work safe

[lupo]

Thanks coalminer3
and what happened to them after the RR's abandonned advertising on the sides of these cars, where they scrapped, painted over, or left in the corner of a yard to vanish in rust and time?
( would be a nice extreme weathering experiment )

[Eriediamond]

Lupo, some of these cars could still be seen up into the early to middle fifties. It wasn't the railroads doing the advertisements on them, but rather the shippers or companies that owned the cars. Also this was not only limited to reefers and box cars. Oil refineries did this as well, just to mention another, so tank cars had there owners names and logos in huge letters and colors as well. Can you imagine what, say Texaco would think if Sunoco or Gulf cars were droped of at a Texaco refinery?

[john lea]

When I went to work on the ole RR, 1960, I saw a, "Chatue Martin" bill board sitting on a spur. I believe it had wine barrels, great big barrels, for hauling bulk wine, like a tank car hidden inside a refer. Years later I found aboud 20 billboard refers, bought them.

[orsonroy]

I think everyone's confusing "billboard reefers" with just plain old reefers here.

The term billboard reefer specifically refers to those reefers that were painted with large, garish advertising slogans on them (rolling billboards). These rolling ads were generally NOT advertising the contents of the reefers, or even the leasing company that owned the cars (remember; most reefers weren't owned by railroads, much like tank cars). The billboard advertising was banned in 1936 (or 1938), and was completely gone from the rails at that time.

Regular reefers were usually painted nice bright colors (yellow and orange, mostly) but carried the names or slogans of the railroads or companies that were leasing them. The cars were regularly seen mixed up together (due to how cars were blocked in the steam era) but would always be routed ONLY to the lesee or their agents. You wouldn't see a SFRD car hauling Armour beef, for instance.

The cars with the billboard ads wouldn't have been shoved onto a siding to rot, they would have been repainted. Freight cars have a lifespan of 20-40 years, while the paint in those days only lasted 5-7, so repainting was commonplace. The cars would have been repainted into leaing fleet schemes, and repainted soon after WWII. Many of the old wood reefers were extensively rebuilt right after WWII, and some ice bunker reefers even lasted into the 1970s (some even made it into BN paint!)