Standard Oil was one of the most all conquering businesses ever. It is mind boggling to think about the control they had not only on the US oil industry but the entire industry worldwide. Eventually the company was busted up by the government (which ultimately benefitted John Rockfeller exponentially MORE than it would have had the thing been a single unit) into a bunch of smaller companies. One of them was Standard Oil of New Jersey which eventually altered its name to Esso. Under the Esso name, the company grew into another massive enterprise and had business holdings all over the world. Like its parent company Esso understood that the more control it had, the better off it was. For instance, they owned the wells, the ships the crude sailed on, the refiners it was brewed in, the trucks that moved it to the stations, and they had high standards for their station owners. This is a film about the gas station end of the business and it is an awesome look at how the oil companies came to understand their customer and better “serve” them (upsell the hell out of ’em is more accurate!)
The film uses animation and a fictional gas station owner who just hung up his shingle in 1930. During that era, stations could carry different brands of gas and customers could choose what they wanted. The reality is that unlike today there was little in the way of uniform controls so quality was wildly different depending on who’s stuff you were buying. Because Standard had their entire operation vertically integrated, they were making the most consistent sauce of the era. We are taken through the evolution of the service station as both a center for profit and a center for the ever expanding automotive culture of the United States. It is uncanny how the two grew together.
We see the years roll on and we see how branding and different products became important, how slogans and catch phrases drove sales, how the war caused a complete revolution inside the industry that was hampered with rationing and other restrictions, etc. The war years are particularly interesting, especially when they show the image of the sad guy locking his station for the last time because he “chose another profession”
after failing in the gas business. The addition of mechanics and added mechanical service at gas stations was a direct result of WWII and the fact that people needed to keep their cars on the road.
This may be a big celebratory video for Esso but in reality is the history of the gas station business in America (which has continued to evolve) as seen through the company that really helped pioneer it. In a cultural sense this is one of the neatest videos we have ever posted. Watch between the lines and look past the overt back slapping for a very interesting story!
