Watched a couple of east and westbound stackers pass, and got to wondering: Is there going to be a return to the old practice of car side advertising? BILLBOARDS on Cars?
Maybe YES/Maybe NO? Post WWI, and Post WWII, there were minor upticks in the presence of billboarding on rail cars; Primarily, it seemed to be on the leased or privately owned reefer fleets.
“…The Association of American Railroads Rule 84, which bans billboards on railroad cars. The rule came about because of logistics. For example, companies and union workers hated it when a car with a Swift & Co. ad would show up at an Armour meat-packing plant for loading. The AAR created Rule 84 to prevent customers from getting upset because of the ads on the cars…” *
This is a rule, and not alaw; but it sure shut down a problem that inflamed the trucker, unions and coprorate types that did not like it(?).
My point is that as the presence of OTR Trailers, [and their various painted identity markings, and also a more recent presence of much more corporate identity graqphics appearing on their containers [ both reefer types, and dry cans.]
When the Billboard cars were rolling, way back when [sigh] Watching a train pass a crossing was an adventure. The advertising on cars was eye-catching, and caught the attention of those watching it go past.
Amazon has added graphics to their ‘cans’, Prime, with FFE, as well, have added some graphics. Graphics on trailers, and containers, as well as bright colored painted schemes seems to be growing trend?
And checking back in the TRAINSNewswire [May 15,2007]
Sam, I’d love to see the billboard cars come back, but you bring up a pretty good point about “taggers.” Taggers seem to find those big white Tropicana cars an irresistable “canvas” for their “art,” to give one example.
As far as I know the rule against billboard cars doesn’t apply as long as the cars don’t leave home rails, hence the “Tropicana Train” which runs on CSX exclusively from Florida to New Jersey.
By the way, the freight trains I run on my O gauge layout are pretty much exclusively classic billboard cars. They just look so cool!
You can’t bring back something that never existed. A lot of people don’t understand that railroads NEVER sold ‘advertising space’ on freight cars. What they did do, starting in the 1800s, do was lease cars to private companies, who then decorated the cars with their company name and perhaps information on their brand names and products. Some early lease cars would have the railroad name on one side, and the private company’s name on the other. This may be where the confusion comes from re ‘advertising’ on railroad cars. (Early in the 20th century, railroads were forced to separate their refrigerator leasing operations to third party companies, due to federal anti-trust laws and regulations.)
Over time, the lettering got very large and colorful, and - as noted earlier - company A would refuse a reefer lettered for competitor B . This meant cars often had to be returned to the leasing company empty, meaning the railroad got less money than they would have back hauling a loaded car.
The (1937-38 IIRC) rule change said lettering on a car couldn’t be larger than I think 16" or 18", unless the owner / leasing co. agreed to pay the ‘loaded’ rate both ways. That meant virtually all ‘billboard’ reefers were repainted by about 1940.
Railroad-owned cars weren’t included in this, so railroads began putting large slogans and lettering on their cars about that time: “Way of the Zephyrs”, “Southern Serves the South”, etc.
Much as I’d love to see some flashier graphics on the cars, I suspect we’re going to be stuck with oxide red and reporting marks any more (OK, CSX paints their boxcars blue…)
And the occasional service mark like [CSX] and CN’s lazy three.
The bean counters would rather see the $ go to the bottom line than fancy paint.
There were some smaller outfits who had official liveries that were quasi graffiti…one comes to mind that I can’t remember the name, but on their boxcars they painted their name along with a palm tree, a moon, and a lake if I recall properly.
Very similar in nature to “Herby”… but without the man
Wayne: I know the subject of ‘tagging’ is normally verboten on these Forums. So Hopefully, we can dance that fine line? As I had mentioned, previously, in this Thread, I have noticed more and more containers coming by that had some pretty serious, professional, graphics packages applied to them .
We’ve also seemed to get more and more of the ‘newer’’ reefer boxes, as well [BNSF owned, and Cyro-Trans, also. ] Some, but not all, of the Big BNSF reefers are victims of tagging, and as well the C-T reefers, but they seems to mostly escape the serious taggers. I read in another sites posting; depending on the size, and coverage of ‘art’; an average ‘paint repair’ can cost the car’s owner anywhere from $1 K to as much as a total repaint for something around several thousands.
The old ‘Billboard’ reefers, got to be problematic, when one compeditor’s car was loaded at a competing company…seemed to upset many folks for different reasons! So they got &#
Those cars are owned/leased/exclusively assigned to Tropicana. The rule doesn’t apply.
Imagine though that CSX provided cars to Tropicana for loading that have MinuteMaid graphics all over them. That’s kinda the point of the rule.
There is absolutely no rule that prevent the car’s owner/lessee from applying their own logos and graphics all over the car. Amazon’s containers cited above are nothing special. They own/lease them. That’s not the same thing as the “billboard advertising” rule.
Sam, as long as the only mention of tagging on the Forum is condemnation of the same I don’t think we’ll get in any trouble. Certainly no-one here is going to praise it!
Maybe, but I doubt it. The times I’ve seen Tropicana trains they were typically 55 to 65 cars long! That’s a lot of juice! Plus, that’s up to 65 less trucks on the road several times a week, coming and going. That train doesn’t have to worry about the vagaries of traffic on the interstates either.
The Juice Train uses Tropicana owned (or Leased) cars. CSX does have a small fleet of a smiliar kind of car to be used to supplement when not enough TPIX cars are available.
In addition to the Trpoicana’s Northern New Jersey distribution center (the destination of the original Juice Train) they have opened DC’s near Cincinnati and in City of Industry, CA. The NJ DC still gets the bulk of the product.
Well, shame on “Uncle Pete” for chasing away business.
By the way, and I’m sure I’ve mentioned this before, but if anyone want to pursue a study of billboard box cars let me recommend a super book.
It’s call “Billboard Refrigerator Cars,” and I’d have to call it a definative work on the subject. Published by Signature Press in 2008 and 220 pages jam-packed with photographs it’s just about everything you’d want to know about billboard cars. I own one myself, and I’m glad I got it!
Well, and of course, there never was “billboard advertising” in the sense of railroads selling/leasing advertising space on cars. As you say, if a company bought or leased a car, they could decorate it however they wanted. However, after about 1940, if the lettering with the company name and product references etc. was over a certain size, they had to agree pay the railroad to move the car to it’s destination and back at essentially the “full car” rate, even if it returned empty. It’s a bit (actually a lot) more involved than that, but basically that’s the gist of it. The cars with large lettering were never technically “banned”, they just became uneconomical to operate in most cases.
They’re not exactly the same situation. UP owned those reefers and discontinued a service they offered. Tropicana (well, Pepsi) owns their equipment and they’re moving over the road like any other shipper having a car moved.
They need to put on their big-boy pants and get back to work. That is really petty. Do they own the car, then they don’t have any say about what it looks like on the outside.
Railroads could lease out the sides as a source of additional revenue. Imagine, your name and logo rolling slowly through a grade crossing with lots of drivers stuck behind the gates, stuck watching.
Feature that in the future pro sports will have corporate logos on all the uniforms - for a sponsor fee. It has already happened on the teams practice unis - the unis they frequently wear to meetings with the media. Pro teams in other countries are alread displaying the logos of their corporate sponsors.
Watched an interview presentation on TV with a couple of NASCAR drivers… Their special driving clothing was covered by various logos. Almost to the point of being ‘walkig buillboards’ [(-D] [swg]
I know that for years the various advertisers (Sponsors) have paid for their inclusion on the the(dirver’s caps), racecar bodies;now it appears that they have carried that over, more than previously, to their clothing. For some reason in this particular interview the sponsor’s logos really stood out.
I’d bet that BaltACD can tell us, chapter and verse, about sponsor logos on uniforms and his race cars! [8D]
memyselfandi motortoyz is sole sponsor, wrench, financier and driver of my race car. The sanctioning body requires certain stickers to be on car and driver’s suit. Cotingency ‘sponsors’ get their stickers on the car in as much as if I win or finish in a podium position those sponsors will ‘pay’ me in the form of product or money for having their sticker on the car. Beyond that I am a one man band.
Throughout the year having the tire supplier’s logo on the car, with a win when 3 or more cars compete in the class will pay 2 tires. If there are 5 or more cars in the cars the 2nd place finisher gets paid 1 tire. At the National Championship Runoffs more companies enter the fray with contingency sponsorship.
Wrapping locomotives in advertising is common in Europe, and Amtrak did it past holiday for Coca-Cola (also switching to Coke products on Amtrak trains). An who would be more likely to do that here than Berkshire-Hatahaway owned BNSF (Geico, Duracell, Dairy Queen, etc)