Today I want to share new items and new shops on my Etsy store. I have been trying to refocus my blog for a while now. I am not comfortable with the “influencer” name or concept as it exists today. I am not here to tell and influence anyone. I just want to share my day-to-day likes and build rapport with people who find them interesting. Not looking for agreement or disagreement. With that said, I am going to restart the blog and Instagram sections. Hope you will want to follow along and share your ideas.
I have always been a vintage-likes person. Having lived in Ireland for over ten years and with a partner who operated an antique business, I have always found vintage to be a draw for me. TV shows like Downtown Abby and The Gilded Age appeal to me. Sometimes. I find myself looking at the decor more than the people. Most likely, because of that bias, I have decorated my space in a traditional/vintage blend. I still go “antiquing” and use my finds and my personal collections to stock my Etsy store.
Today I want to tell you about a vintage collectors item. The Etsy format does not allow me to tell viewers the “back story” of my items. I almost always have a story about the item. It might be an educational piece describing the why or how the item came to be. Or it might be a story on how I found or hunted the items.
Shultz & Dooley
I grew up in upstate New York. Local breweries were a common finding. In Albany, there was Schaeffer Beer; in western NY, there was Genesee Beer; and in Utica, there was Utica Club. Some of the nation’s beers of the time that come to mind are Ballantine, Black Label, and Schlitz. In the 1960s, Budweiser, Patbts Blue Ribbon, and Miller High Life came to the fore, as did many others. Beer has always been a highly popular alcoholic beverage, and for many, the first legal alcoholic drink they had at age eighteen.
Utica Club is considered the first beer made after Prohibition. The company was founded in 1888 by FX Matt, followed by his son, Walter J. Matt, in 1951, and his grandson, FX Matt II, in 1980. It stayed alive, making soft drinks until prohibition was repealed in 1944. The brewery obtained the first license to produce alcohol under the West End Brewery Co; the first beer was Utical Club.
To promote the new enterprise, the company developed an effective marketing strategy. They introduced Schultz & Dooley, the “spokesmugs” of Utica Club, along with commercials featuring Jonathan Winters’s voice, which helped increase sales by more than 50%. LINK.
The company made multiple commercials featuring the mugs, and while it started with the two characters, it continued the ad campaign in the 1980s and introduced over 60 characters in total
AInotes:
There are currently over 60 different character designs in the famous Utica Club Schultz & Dooley series. Produced by the F.X. Matt Brewing Company (formerly WEBCO) since 1959, the collection has expanded far beyond the original cast to include occupational, holiday, and special anniversary steins. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
While the characters originally starred in award-winning television commercials in the 1950s and 1960s, the ongoing collector series has grown significantly. Some of the most notable characters in the series include: [1, 2]
You can explore the complete history and view the extensive list of characters at this location
A cute YouTube video HERE
COLLECTORS ITEM
There still exists a great love for the Utical Club Steins. Many strive to collect all sixty. There are Utical Club fan and collector clubs all over the world.
There were many iterations of the mugs over time. Originally made in 1959 and marked West End Brewery made in Germany / then marked WEBCO made in Germany. Another company made the form from 1960 to 2065. And again in 1972- 1982 the mugs were made in Brazil by Ceramante. During this time, the company introduced new characters: Office Suds and The Countess. These featured in TV commercials with the main characters.
WEBCO then had the maker of Office Suds produce the steins directly for WEBCO. The company continued over the years with different makers in Germany until 2003. Currently, the steins are made in China.
The complete history and a link to the Stein catalog made by Frank Loevi can be found at this LINK.
Sorry to go so long, I do hope you enjoyed the trip down memory lane/information. Maybe you have a collection of WEBCO mugs or might wish to start one. The link to the Etsy store is HERE and also at the top of the blog. The following Etsy link take you to the shop and share link at the Etsy shop for My Etsy Store
