H and H Coffee

Dedicated to the history of the Hoffmann-Hayman Coffee Co. founded 1899 in San Antonio, Texas.

Paper bags in three functional roles — retail counter sale, wholesale store delivery, and wartime tin substitute — ran alongside the tins and jars across the full H and H retail era. Burlap green-coffee import sacks appear in the corpus as supply-chain context references, not H&H-produced packaging.

Quick ID:

  • Retail counter bag (H and H Blend) — kraft or cream paper; red H AND H branding; 1 lb consumer format
  • Retail counter bag (Texas Girl) — pink/magenta ground; cream Texas Girl medallion portrait above block type; 1 lb; unused example in Mac Johanson collection (HH-REF-0000-0012); in-collection pink example (HH-COLL-0000-0044) similar but note possible color-run difference
  • Wholesale shipping outer — large kraft paper bag; stenciled or printed “24 — 1 LB. BAGS REGULAR,” “24 — 1 LB. BAGS DRIP,” or “12 — 2 LB. BAGS”; H and H Blend and Texas Girl lines both documented; inner retail bags shipped to grocers inside the outer
  • Flav-O-Tainer — heat-sealed, cellophane-lined paper bag for H&H Drip Grind Coffee (Dec 1942–Jul 1943); wartime tin substitute; no physical specimen known — documented in press only
  • Green-coffee import sack — burlap; 100–132 lb; exporter stamps (Tealdo/Lima Peru; Guatemala 1939/1940); not H&H branded; supply-chain context only

Bag types

Retail paper counter bag. One-pound consumer bags for point-of-sale purchase. Two documented brand liveries:

  • H and H Blend — Kraft or cream stock; red H AND H branding. Documented in HH-REF-0000-0003 (H and H 1 pound Bags) and HH-REF-0000-0004 (H and H Bag). A sealed example with product inside has not been documented — the wanted item HH-WNT-0000-0003 represents this gap.
  • Texas Girl — Pink or magenta ground; cream Texas Girl medallion portrait over a black “Texas Girl” banner; “Texas Girl Coffee” printed on the folded bottom panel. Two examples document the type: HH-COLL-0000-0044 (in collection; pink stock; c.1935; “exact pack date not yet confirmed from paper”) and HH-REF-0000-0012 (Mac Johanson collection; unused; magenta ground). Whether the pink and magenta variants represent distinct print runs or the same run at different fading stages is not established.

Wholesale shipping outer bag. Large multi-unit paper bags used to ship retail bags to grocery stores. The stenciled or printed header identifies the contents: “24 — 1 LB. BAGS REGULAR,” “24 — 1 LB. BAGS DRIP,” or “12 — 2 LB. BAGS.” Both H and H Blend (HH-COLL-0000-0018, HH-COLL-0000-0021) and Texas Girl Drip (HH-COLL-0000-0019) outers are in the collection. The 24-unit 1-lb outer and the 12-unit 2-lb outer are documented; other size combinations may exist. All in-collection outers were acquired as empty shells — no sealed example with retail bags inside has been documented.

Flav-O-Tainer heat-sealed bag (Dec 1942–Jul 1943). During WWII civilian metal rationing, H and H replaced its vacuum tin with a heat-sealed, cellophane-lined paper bag for H and H Drip Grind Coffee. The Flav-O-Tainer wordmark was pitched as preserving freshness without tin. The brand ran from approximately December 1942 through July 1943 before H and H returned to metal cans. No physical specimen has been documented in any collection; the type is known only from press coverage. See Flav-O-Tainer — brand guide.

Green-coffee import sacks (context reference). Two burlap sacks in the reference corpus document the form of raw green-coffee import packaging typical of the H and H era — not H&H-produced or -labeled. HH-REF-2015-0004 is a Peruvian import sack (Café Peru / N.B. Tealdo & Co., Lima, “LX” exporter mark, “Product of Peru”). HH-REF-2015-0005 is a Guatemalan import sack (1939/1940 crop; 132 lb “ESP BRTO”). Both were photographed 3 July 2015 for supply-chain context. The 1942 bulk price sheet (HH-REF-1942-0002) references 100-pound bag lots and an upcharge for “cotton bags” vs. drums.

Grind callouts

Shipping outers carry explicit grind callouts that parallel the tin system: Regular and Drip. No “Pulverized” outer has been documented, though the Pulverized grind appears on tins. The Drip callout on Texas Girl outers (HH-COLL-0000-0019) cross-dates the outer format to the Drip-grind era (post-c.1930).

Manufacturer

No manufacturer marks or printer credits have been documented on any H and H paper bag or shipping outer in the collection. The 1942 bulk wholesale price sheet (HH-REF-1942-0002) lists a per-bag surcharge for “cotton bags” as an alternative to drums for bulk roasted coffee, suggesting bags were a standard commercial commodity rather than a custom-printed H and H product.

Artifacts

In the collection

  • HH-COLL-0000-0018 — 24-1lb Bag Sacks — H and H shop-delivery outer (one of a lot with Texas Girl ephemera; Albert picker)
  • HH-COLL-0000-0019 — 24-1lb shipping sacks — H and H Coffee Regular and Texas Girl Coffee Drip (acquired Oct 2014)
  • HH-COLL-0000-0021 — 12-2lb Bag Sacks — H and H 2-pound shipping outer (acquired Dec 2014)
  • HH-COLL-0000-0044 — Texas Girl Coffee paper bag — pink, medallion front, c.1935

Reference

  • HH-REF-0000-0003 — H and H 1 pound Bags (reference documentation)
  • HH-REF-0000-0004 — H and H Bag (reference documentation)
  • HH-REF-0000-0012 — Texas Girl Coffee one-pound paper bag, unused — magenta ground, cream portrait (Mac Johanson collection)
  • HH-REF-1942-0002 — 1942 bulk wholesale price sheet — lists 100-lb bag lots, cotton bag surcharge (see Open questions)
  • HH-REF-2015-0004 — Peru green coffee burlap import sack (Tealdo/Lima; “Product of Peru”) — supply-chain context
  • HH-REF-2015-0005 — Guatemala green coffee burlap import sack (1939/1940, 132 lb) — supply-chain context

Wanted

  • HH-WNT-0000-0003 — H and H 1-pound bag, sealed with product inside — same image as HH-REF-0000-0003; wanted status indicates no owned physical specimen of the 1-lb H&H bag

Open questions

  • Is HH-REF-1942-0002 correctly classified as nomenclature_term: "bag"? The artifact is a typewritten bulk wholesale price sheet, not a bag — its subject matter references 100-lb bag lots as a unit of sale, but the paper itself is a pricing document. May warrant reclassification to clipping or document.
  • Are HH-REF-2015-0004 and HH-REF-2015-0005 (green-coffee import sacks) correctly assigned nomenclature_term: "bag"? They are supply-chain context references, not H&H-produced packaging.
  • Do the Texas Girl bags in HH-COLL-0000-0044 (pink) and HH-REF-0000-0012 (magenta) represent two distinct print runs or color variants of a single design?
  • Has any sealed retail H and H bag with product inside been documented in any collection? All in-collection examples are empty shells.
  • Has any Flav-O-Tainer specimen survived? No physical example is known; the Dec 1942–Jul 1943 wartime bag type is documented only in press coverage.
  • What printer or manufacturer produced the H and H and Texas Girl retail counter bags? No marks or credits have been found.
  • Were shipping outers produced in grind variants beyond Regular and Drip (e.g., Pulverized)?

See also