Country Coffee Company
The deliberately anonymous shelf corporation Continental Coffee used to acquire Hoffmann-Hayman in December 1962. Country Coffee Company was incorporated in Texas on 29 November 1962 (Secretary of State entity #18865100) and, twelve days later on 11 December 1962, took the name “The Hoffmann-Hayman Coffee Company” — the same day the original 1912 Hoffmann-Hayman corporation surrendered it. It is the Continental-side vehicle of the hand-off, and the primary-source anchor for the Continental Coffee Company acquisition.
The incorporation
The Articles of Incorporation (TX SOS certified copy, document 1596946140008) were signed 16 November 1962 and filed 29 November 1962 under the Texas Business Corporation Act. The certified copy issues under the entity’s final legal name, “Continental Coffee Company of Colorado” — the shelf name and the eventual corporate identity both visible on one document.
- Purpose: “to make, process, buy, sell and otherwise deal in coffee, tea, condiments and food products” — an operating vehicle, not a real-estate shell.
- Capital: 20,000 common shares at $10 par; no business until $75,000 consideration was received.
- Registered office / agent: Republic National Bank Building, Dallas; C T Corporation System.
The Chicago board — Continental’s orbit
All five initial directors sat at One North La Salle Street, Chicago: Paul Homer, Jerome Marks, Sheldon Karon, Charles N. Salzman, and Henry H. Koven. The single Chicago address ties the vehicle to Continental Coffee’s corporate orbit; which of the five were Continental officers versus outside counsel is an open question. Paul Homer also signed as an incorporator.
The San Antonio incorporators
Two of the three incorporators — Kathleen Paisley and Luella Fabian, both at 2100 N.B.C. (National Bank of Commerce) Building, San Antonio — satisfied the Act’s Texas-citizen requirement and were notarized in Bexar County on 19 November 1962. They read as local law-office staff; the N.B.C. Building address is a lead on which San Antonio firm papered the acquisition.
Why the shelf name
The generic “Country Coffee Company” name, the two-week gap between filing and the H&H name adoption, and the precise 11 December 1962 synchronization with the 1912 corporation’s surrender of the name all read as a confidential acquisition being staged — a clean corporate vehicle stood up to receive the H&H brand and business without announcing Continental’s hand in advance. Continental then ran the plant under the H&H name until the 1965 rename to Continental Coffee Company of Texas (per the corporate registry).
See also
Companies
- Continental Coffee Company — the acquiring parent; this vehicle is its Texas entry point
- Hoffmann-Hayman Coffee Company — the 1912 corporation that surrendered the name on 11 Dec 1962
- Master Chef Food Products — the brand line that passed to Continental in the sale