H and H Crystalvac

A vacuum-packed reusable crystal jar packaging innovation introduced by Hoffmann-Hayman Coffee Co. in June 1932. Described as “revolutionizing the local coffee industry.” The first vacuum-packing equipment for glass in Texas.

Overview

  • Product name: H and H Crystalvac (registered trademark: “Reg. U.S. Pat. Off.”)
  • Full description: Vacuum-packed, re-usable crystal jar coffee
  • Slogan: “It’s Days Fresher, and It Stays Fresher”
  • Launch: June 1932 (public press announcement; in one-pound jars)
  • First use: April 1, 1932 — per USPTO trademark filing (Serial No. 327,979, filed June 14, 1932; Official Gazette, Nov 29, 1932, p. 1062). The jar was in production two months before the June 3 newspaper announcement.
  • Expanded: December 1932 (three-pound jars added)

Packaging specifications

  • Jar type: Screw-cap crystal (glass) jar
  • Capacity: 1 and a quarter quarts liquid measure
  • Lid compatibility: Standard Kerr and Mason-Ball lids
  • Reuse: After coffee is used, jar is suitable for preserving fruits, pickles, and any canning purpose
  • Sizes available: Half-pound, one-pound (launch), three-pound (December 1932); also continued in tin

Technology

  • Equipment cost: Over $10,000 (since January 1, 1932); “several thousand dollars” for the vacuum-packing apparatus
  • Jar supplier: Three Rivers Glass Company, San Antonio — initial order: 250,000 jars
  • First in state: The Hoffmann-Hayman equipment brought to San Antonio “the first apparatus of its kind in the state”
  • Process: Coffee vacuum-packed under high vacuum with modern machinery; screw cap seals tightly; continuous freshness assured until last spoonful

Marketing

Miss Katherine Schaeffer shown displaying the reusable container in July 1932 press coverage.

Introductory offer (December 1932, with 3-lb jar purchase at 29¢): two imported cups and saucers, one package black pepper, one package tea, one bottle vanilla extract — total retail value 55¢.

1935 — Sam Houston in Crystalvac; 3¢ jar deposit + kite premium

By March 1935, the Crystalvac jar format had been extended beyond the flagship H and H Blend to a second branded line: Sam Houston Coffee (1935-03-09 News — see also Sam Houston Coffee § March 1935). The same article documents the reuse economy that made the jars a successful repeat-customer mechanic: 3 cents per returned one-pound jar refundable at grocers or directly at the H-H plant, plus an “H & H Flyer” box-kite premium redeemable for three returned one-pound jars — quoted by R. W. Menger as a deliberate strategy to keep jars circulating. The 1935 piece also alludes to a parallel “new baby package” repackage for Texas Girl Coffee, launched in the same window.

Impact

  • Added 15 employees at Hoffmann-Hayman plant at launch
  • “Phenomenal consumer acceptance and increasing demand” led to 3-pound expansion within six months
  • A large Crystalvac container depicted in pre-construction plans as a rooftop landmark for 601 Delaware (unconfirmed; no post-construction photograph located — see Crystalvac Jars § Wanted)

Glass supplier succession (1932–1947+)

Crystalvac jars passed through three glass-supplier firms across the 1932–1947+ documented run, reflecting consolidation in the regional and national glass industry rather than H&H-driven sourcing changes.

  • Three Rivers Glass Company (1932–1936/37) — original supplier. Texas-based glass plant ~90 miles south of San Antonio; the initial Crystalvac order of 250,000 jars is documented in the June 1932 launch press. Charles R. Tips was the senior glass-side executive across the Crystalvac launch and early run — sec-treas (1922 founding) → general manager (by 1929) → president (by Feb 1931, styled “Col. Charles R. Tips” in period press). His tenure spans the full pre-Ball Three Rivers production window for Crystalvac jars. The plant was acquired by Ball Brothers in 1936; operations ceased by 1937.
  • Ball Brothers Glass Manufacturing Company (1936–?) — Muncie, Indiana national glass manufacturer. Acquired Three Rivers in 1936. Crystalvac jars dated to the mid-to-late 1930s carry Ball heritage marks; the precise span of Ball-period Crystalvac production is open pending a mold-mark survey (see the Three Rivers Glass Bottles reference inventory for specimens, and the Three Rivers Glass Company page for the 1936/37 closure context).
  • Owens-Illinois Glass Company (post-Ball–1947+) — national glass manufacturer. Owens-Illinois mold marks on surviving Crystalvac jars document production through at least 1947. Owens-Illinois absorbed multiple regional glass plants in the late-1930s consolidation; whether the H&H Crystalvac supply moved directly from Three Rivers → Owens-Illinois or via the Ball acquisition stage is the open question that Crystalvac Jars mold-mark survey work is built to resolve.

The Crystalvac brand spans the entire three-supplier arc without an apparent change in trade dress or wordmark — H&H kept the Crystalvac identity stable across regional plant ownership changes. The wordmark continuity across three suppliers and 15+ years is itself a documented case of packaging-tech brand portability decoupled from glass-supplier identity.

Brands carried in Crystalvac

Crystalvac was a packaging-technology wordmark, not a coffee brand — multiple H&H coffee lines shipped in the format across the 1932–1947+ active window:

Notably Master Chef Coffee was distributed primarily in lithographed strip-key tins (per the 1959 Burpee promo’s “unwinding strip” proof-of-purchase mechanism) rather than in Crystalvac jars, despite the brand’s substantial 1932+ run. H and H Drip Grind moved into Flav-O-Tainer cellophane-lined paper bags during the 1942–43 metal-rationing window rather than Crystalvac. The Crystalvac format was paired with retail brands targeting the home-canning / reuse-economy segment rather than the institutional-tin or wartime-paper segments.

Packaging-technology wordmark precedent

Crystalvac is the first of two H&H packaging-technology wordmarks documented on this site — wordmarks that brand the package itself rather than the coffee inside it. The second is Flav-O-Tainer (1942), the WWII cellophane-lined paper bag that replaced tin vacuum cans during civilian metal rationing. Comparing the two:

  Crystalvac (1932) Flav-O-Tainer (1942)
Technology Vacuum-packed reusable glass jar Heat-sealed cellophane-lined paper bag
Driver Peacetime factory-modernization; tin prices rising WWII civilian metal rationing
Equipment cost Over $10,000 (new vacuum-pack machinery) Not disclosed in surviving ads
Supplier Three Rivers Glass Company (initial order 250,000 jars) Not identified in surviving ads
Trademark filing Serial No. 327,979, filed June 14, 1932; Official Gazette Nov 29, 1932, p. 1062. Covers Crystalvac wordmark + H AND H BLEND Coffee logotype jointly. Use since Apr. 1, 1932. Also: Serial No. 327,191 (Aug. 9, 1932, Class 33) for the empty glass jar form itself. Quote-marked in copy (“‘FLAV-O-TAINER’”) but no on-site filing record yet
Wordmark structure Hyphenless compound: Crystal + Vac Hyphenated 3-part: Flav-O-Tainer
Active window 1932 – at least 1947 (Owens-Illinois mold marks; long postwar tail) 1942–1943 (single wartime window; obsolete when tin rationing ended)
Reuse / value-add Refundable 3¢ jar deposit + H & H Flyer box-kite premium (per 1935 Sam Houston extension); jars repurposable for home canning Disposable; “Gift Offer List and Coupon Inside” front-panel callout

Crystalvac and Flav-O-Tainer represent the two ends of H&H’s packaging-tech wordmark arc: a peacetime-modernization durables-glass brand built around reuse-economy and Three Rivers supplier integration vs. a wartime-substitution disposable-paper brand built around metal-conservation. Jav-O (1954) — a separate H&H “-O” wordmark — is a coffee-product brand rather than a packaging brand and so sits in a different family despite sharing the hyphenated “-O” typographic convention with Flav-O-Tainer.

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