540. WHEN MAGNOLIA MILK PRODUCTS CAME IN BOTTLES

MAGNOLIA started as an ice cream brand in 1925, but it wasn’t long that it began to carry dairy products—as basic as milk, for instance—sold in bottles. By the pre-war years, the company’s MAGNOLIA MILK had become an established brand, sold carafe shaped clear glass bottles, and promoted for its taste and health benefits.

The years that followed showed MAGNOLIA’s bottles dairy lines expanding. In 1957, a milk-based chocolate drink, Choco-Vim, came out in bottles of various shapes—one looked like a soda bottle, but most came in short, squat bottles with sloping sides and a small opening.

Around the 60s, the dairy bottles were standardized. The clear bottles had straight sides, ending with a narrow opening, with an applied blue colored label bearing the distinctive blue Magnolia logo , the product name, and topped by a scrimped carboard crown, further protected and sealed by a pull-out-tab.

Both its white milk product, now branded as Magnolia Fresh Cow’s Milk, and its new Magnolia Chocolait line—introduced after the phase out of Choco-Vim—sported these kinds of bottles and were used all throughout the 70s. In 1975, Magnolia Whole Cow’s Recon Milk, a reconstituted fortified milk.

In the 1980s, San Miguel Packaging Products (SMPP) began introducing innovations in packaging designs. The former straight sided bottle lost its rounded corners, and assumed a more streamlined round shape with a short neck and mouth, with a more contemporary applied color label. The name Magnolia, in small case letters, both in open and solid types, circumscribed the middle of the bottle.

This was used across all its milk products line, including the Magnolia Low Fat Milk, a premium milk introduced in 1984. When the fruit juice drink line was launched that same year, they were also packaged in the same bottle.

MAGNOLIA LOW FAT MILK, PRINT AD, 1984

To address tampering issues, a new Tamper Resistant Seal was added to safeguard the freshness and purity of  Magnolia milk products, as well as its bottled juice products.

MAGNOLIA BOTTLES WITH TAMPER RESISTANT SEALS, 1984

By the late 1980s, packaging for products have shifted to using tetra packs and PET bottles, which have the advantage of being lighter, cheaper to produce, and easier to dispose. Carton-based aseptic Tetra packs and flexible doypacks, for example, were more hygienic, thus preserving the integrity of the product. They were easy to carry, saved store space, and even came with their own drinking straws. PET bottles were recyclable, lightweight, and less likely to be broken.

A CASE FOR MAGNOLIA GLASS BOTTLES, 1987

Magnolia made an effort to extoll the virtues of its bottled milk products when it put out an omnibus ad that proffered the benefits of glass bottles. But it was soon clear that the end in sight for glass bottles---and eventually Magnolia would abandon glass bottles for their milk products altogether, shifting to standing tetra packs for their Fresh Milk, Full Cream Milk, Low Fat and Flavored Milk.

331. Just Add Ice and Milk! JUDY’S HALO-HALO IN CANS, 1963

JUDY'S HALO-HALO, print ad 1963

 Now here’s a product innovation that’s theoretically brilliant—a canned halo-halo! Imagine, your favorite refreshing Filipino dessert, yours to enjoy straight from the can—just add shaved ice and milk!  JUDY’S HALO-HALO, which came out in the early 1960s, packed a halo-halo mix of sweet beans, preserved kamote, banana, langka bits and sakobi (tapioca pearls) in a tin can. By adding shaved ice, evaporated milk, and a scoop of leche flan or ube haleya, you can easily make your own halo-halo creation. But the idea, however clever, did not take off. It’s probably because halo-halo was readily available in any neighborhood, and can be made using fresher, more natural ingredients—no preservatives needed.  At a cheaper price too, since in those days, you had the option of bringing your own glass. JUDY’S HALO-HALO even had the budget to advertise in national weekly magazine, using strip ads, but no amount of marketing push could help the product.  You could say that the reception to JUDY’s HALO-HALO was cold, its sale, well, frozen.

264. DRINKING GLASSES from CAFÉ PURO, BLEND 45 AND NESCAFE, BLEND 45, 1966-1975.

Before the 1960s decade, there were just a handful of coffee brands in the market—like Hills Bros. and Chase & Sanborn, which were American imports. Then, Commonwealth Foods, Inc. began manufacturing the post-war brand CAFÉ PURO, and by 1951, it had become the no.1 selling coffee brand nationwide, a position it held until the 1960s came along.

This was when more coffee brands came into the fray--Consolidated Food Corporation (CFC), founded in 1961 by John Gokongwei Jr., introduced BLEND 45, an affordable coffee that became known as “the people’s coffee”, with its budget-friendly price and favorable taste. 

NESCAFE, was introduced in the mid 50s decade by Nestlé, and aggressively advertised in the 60s.

With more competitors coming into the picture, all sorts of promotions were launched to entice customers and add more product value. Using a reusable packaging as added product value was an old—but a proven tried and tested idea. It came naturally for coffee brands too. In the post-war 50s, coffee brands still came in round tins, including NESCAFE.  

Then, with the advent of instant coffee brands, wide-mouth glass jars were utilized, and discarded or sold after use. But what if the packaging had more utilitarian value after the product has been consumed?

CRYSTAL ANNIVERSARY GLASS WITH FLIP-OFF CAP, 1966 Print Ad

This led to the  idea of packaging instant coffee in drinking glasses that could be used long after the last coffee drop has been sipped. The glass serves also as a remnder of the pleasure of the coffee-drinking experience. It also helped that specially-designed, set-building glasses encouraged repeat purchases as they became collectibles.

 

CRYSTAL ANNIVERSARY GLASSES, 199 Print Ad

The free, giveaway glasses were given fanciful names to appeal to consumers’ eye. As expected, market leader CAFÉ PURO came out first with its “Crystal Glasses”--to celebrate its 15th anniversary-- with flip-off plastic caps in 1966. 

GLASSES, PITCHER AND SHAKERS FROM CAFE PURO, 1967 Ad

The promotion was so enthusiastically received that the next year, CAFÉ PURO launched  their “Philippine Dance” glass series—with not just 12 glasses but also coffee shakers to collect.

 

CAFE PURO RAINBOW GLASSES, 1969 Print Ad

In 1969, CAFÉ PURO offered its “Rainbow Glasses” collection, with “colors a-glow-glow”! There were 6 colors of glasses to choose from.

 

IMPERIAL CRYSTAL GLASSES FROM BLEND 45, 1967 Ad

Not to be outdone, BLEND 45 came up with its “Windsor Crystal Party Glasses” and “Crystal Imperial Glasses” offer, which were all successful.  The more premium NESCAFE introduced its decaffeinated brand in squat "diamond" glasses with repeating diamond shapes in raised relief. Many of these glasses could still be found being used in many Filipino homes to this day, still stored and kept in glass cabinets after all these years.

 

NESCAFE ESPRESSO IN DIAMOND GLASS, 1975 Ad

Eventually, the promotions came to include storage jars, pitchers,--and with the surge in popularity of coffee houses—coffee mugs in glass and ceramic, like what NESCAFE and CAFÉ PURO use.  BLEND 45, meanwhile, has done away with glass bottles and uses only foil packs today.