H and H Coffee

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

El Merito (“The Merit”) is a thinly-documented San Antonio coffee line that appears in only two primary sources on this site — the 24 August 1912 and 4 May 1915 San Antonio Express-News “Sugar and Coffee” retailer market columns. Both quote El Merito at the wholesale-to-retailer price level alongside other Morrison-era house names (Broncho, Border, Wesco, Auto Blend, Juanita, Metropolis). After May 1915 the brand drops out of the documented record — it is not named in the 28 January 1917 Express Hoffmann-Hayman / Morrison acquisition announcement, not in the December 1914 Morrison page-44 ink-drawing montage, and not in any later H&H roster (Aug 1917 wholesale line, Oct 1917 Liberty Loan cell, 1923 Light products grid, 1926 Light “Largest Coffee Plant,” 1942 wholesale price sheet).

The current page is a research stub built around the two market-column citations. El Merito’s ownership is uncertain: the 1912 column author groups it among “Morrison-era house names,” but that framing is editorial, not a direct attribution from Morrison’s own copy. The brand may have been a separately-owned San Antonio Spanish-named line that the Express-News market reporter happened to quote alongside Morrison brands, or it may have been a Morrison line discontinued before the February 1917 Morrison-to-H&H transfer. The Spanish wordmark (“El Merito” = “The Merit”) is consistent with San Antonio’s Tejano grocery market and parallels later H&H lines aimed at the same regional demographic (Juanita, Anita Brand).

Documented appearances

24 August 1912 — Sugar and coffee market column

The 24 August 1912 Express-News sugar-and-coffee market block quotes El Merito in the roasted ladder at retailer pricing:

“Roasted: Broncho, 1-lb. cans, 24c; … Juanita Blend, ground, 10-oz. cans, 8c; Juanita Blend, ground, 1-lb. cans, 20c; El Merito, 1-lb. cans, 28c; Metropolis, 2-lb. cans, 64c.”

El Merito is documented at 1-lb. cans for 28¢ — no “with premium” give-away language, unlike Broncho’s “4 lbs. with premium” and Border’s “4-lb. pails with premium” in the same column. El Merito sat in a straight retail can format without bundled incentives.

4 May 1915 — Sugar and coffee market column

The 4 May 1915 Express-News continues the same column form. El Merito reappears with a price drop but the same can format:

“Juanita blend, ground, 10 ounce cans, 8c; Juanita blend, ground, 1-pound cans, 20c; El Merito, 1-pound cans, 25c; Metropolis, 2-pound cans, 34c; Sunset brand, 32c; Mrs. Rorer’s brand, 28c; Maxwell House …”

The 1-lb. can format persisted across both years; the price dropped from 28¢ to 25¢ — a roughly 10.7% decrease. El Merito is the only Morrison-era column brand whose price visibly fell between 1912 and 1915 on this site’s two-column sample:

Brand Format Aug 1912 May 1915 Change
Broncho 1-lb. cans 24¢ 24¢ unchanged
Wesco 1-lb. cans 31¢ 33¢ +2¢
Juanita Blend 1-lb. cans (ground) 20¢ 20¢ unchanged
El Merito 1-lb. cans 28¢ 25¢ −3¢
Metropolis 2-lb. cans 64¢ 34¢ −30¢ (~47% — verified against both source scans; see Metropolis Coffee for analysis)

Possible explanations for the El Merito price drop: a Cordova-bean substitution that reduced cost, a competitive response to neighbor brands, or a deliberate price-down market repositioning to drive volume. None is documented in the column copy itself.

Documented absence after May 1915

El Merito is conspicuously absent from every later primary source on this site that covers Morrison or H&H brand inventory:

  • 13 December 1914 Express-News Morrison page-44 montage — visible Morrison packs include Wesco, Broncho, Juanita/Pride of the Ranch, Texco, Harvest Jubilee, Misa Brand, Club Chocolate. No El Merito.
  • 21 March 1916 Morrison “Special Notice” correcting Wesco and Misa can pricing. No El Merito.
  • 28 January 1917 Hoffmann-Hayman / Morrison acquisition announcement — names Wesco, Misa, Broncho, Texco, Juanita as the Morrison brands H&H committed to continue packing. No El Merito.
  • 29 April 1917 “That Morning’s Cup of Coffee” — names H&H, Wesco, Misa, Texco as the four “popular brands.” No El Merito.
  • 19 August 1917 Express wholesale roster (307 N. Medina). No El Merito.
  • 26 August 1923 San Antonio Light products grid. No El Merito.
  • 28 November 1926 Light “Largest Coffee Plant” — H AND H BLEND, SAM HOUSTON, BRONCHO, BORDER, MENGER PEABERRY, TEXCO. No El Merito.
  • 2 March 1942 H&H wholesale package and bulk price sheets. No El Merito.

Ownership — open question

Three candidate explanations parallel the Auto Blend ownership question:

  • El Merito was a Morrison brand discontinued before the Feb 1917 acquisition — between May 1915 (last documented appearance) and Jan 1917 (acquisition announcement), the line may have been dropped from Morrison’s portfolio. The Jan 1917 announcement uses “including” rather than “exclusively.”
  • El Merito was a separately-owned San Antonio Spanish-named line that the Express-News market reporter quoted alongside Morrison brands for column convenience. The presence of non-Morrison neighbors in the same column — Sunset brand, Mrs. Rorer’s, Maxwell House (the 1915 column extends into national brands) — suggests the column is not exclusively a Morrison roster.
  • El Merito was acquired but not packed by H&H — the Jan 1917 announcement doesn’t claim to be exhaustive; H&H could have acquired the wordmark and chosen not to advertise or carry it.

Resolving this requires: (a) period Morrison advertising naming El Merito with owner attribution; (b) Texas Secretary of State trademark filings showing Morrison’s portfolio at registration; or (c) a 1913–1916 distributor circular naming the brand’s owner.

Products

  1. El Merito — 1-pound can, 28¢ retailer price (Aug 1912)
  2. El Merito — 1-pound can, 25¢ retailer price (May 1915)

Unlike Broncho, Border, and Auto Blend in the same columns, El Merito did not carry a “with premium” give-away — it was sold as a straight retail 1-lb. can in both documented years.

Packaging

No museum object or illustrated pack art is on the site. Unlike Wesco, Broncho, Juanita, Texco, and Misa — all visible in the 13 December 1914 Morrison page-44 ink-drawing montage — El Merito is not depicted in any surviving period display. The 1912 and 1915 sugar-and-coffee market columns are typeset price lists with no illustrations.

Advertising

  1. Sugar and coffee — 24 Aug 1912 — El Merito in the 1-lb. can retailer ladder at 28¢.
  2. Sugar and coffee — 4 May 1915 — El Merito in the 1-lb. can retailer ladder at 25¢, alongside Sunset, Mrs. Rorer’s, and Maxwell House.

Collection posts

Reference photography

No El Merito pack is in Our Collection, and no reference photograph exists in Reference. The brand has no visible pack art on the site whatsoever.

Newspaper & period branding

Only the two market-column facsimiles (1912 and 1915) document El Merito. Indexes: Newspaper ads · Branding in Newspapers.

  • Auto Blend Coffee — parallel Morrison-era column brand with the same ownership caveat (not in Jan 1917 acquisition announcement) and same two-source documentary footprint. Differs from El Merito in that Auto Blend shifted package size between 1912 and 1915 while keeping the price flat, where El Merito kept the package size flat and dropped the price.
  • Border Coffee — co-quoted in both market columns; also has an ambiguous Morrison-attribution caveat (not named in the Jan 1917 acquisition announcement) and is the third brand in this “Morrison-era but unattributed” cohort.
  • Juanita Coffee — Spanish-named Morrison brand named in the Jan 1917 acquisition announcement. The Anita Coffee open question — possible Juanita → Anita rebrand — is a related Spanish-naming-continuity thread; whether El Merito ever connected to that thread is undocumented.
  • Metropolis Coffee — parallel Morrison-era column brand with the same ownership caveat and the largest documented price drop in the 1912–1915 sample (64¢ → 34¢ on 2-lb. cans, ~47%).

Open questions

  • Was El Merito a Morrison brand? Not named in the 28 Jan 1917 acquisition announcement; the 1915 column places it alongside non-Morrison neighbors (Sunset, Mrs. Rorer’s, Maxwell House), weakening the “Morrison-era roster” framing. Resolution requires period Morrison advertising or Texas trademark records.
  • Why the 28¢ → 25¢ price drop? No primary source explains the 10.7% decrease at the same can format. Competitive pressure, bean-substitution, or volume-pricing strategy?
  • Spanish-naming continuity. El Merito (1912–1915) and Juanita (1912–1917) are both Spanish-named Morrison-era brands; Anita (1937–1942+) is the later H&H Spanish-named line. Whether El Merito’s discontinuation cleared the way for Juanita’s continued use, or whether all three lines aimed at slightly different Tejano-market price points, is undocumented.

Wanted

  1. Any El Merito can (1912–1916) — would document the trade dress directly.
  2. Period advertising that names El Merito with owner attribution (Morrison, an independent San Antonio Spanish-market roaster, or otherwise).
  3. Distributor circulars or trade-press items from 1913–1916 that mention El Merito — would close the window between the last documented citation and the Jan 1917 Morrison acquisition.

Contact with leads.