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1953-1955 Kaiser’s Attempt to Standardize Marketing

• CATEGORIES: Advertising & Brochures, Features This site contains affiliate links for which I may be compensated.

UPDATE: II: Barry Thomas has updated his thoughts on this video at his Farm Jeep site:

https://www.farmjeep.com/2021/08/01/a-jeep-movie-that-was-never-released/

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UPDATE I From July 11/2021: This video was shared by the Goddess herself, Deborah. It used the 1954 Willys Export Company’s brochure as the lens through which is shows the variety of jeeps in this movie clip (in color no less). You can learn more about the various forms of this brochure below. This brochure did not have a form number.

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Originally posted January 12, 2020: As noted by Edgar Kaiser in 1955, one of the key reasons Kaiser bought Willys’ assets was that Kaiser didn’t feel Willys-Overland was pursuing the consumer market aggressively enough. As a part of Kaiser’s strategy to move that direction, the company created a wide variety of brochures, folders, direct mail pieces, product booklets, post cards, a Jeep family 16mm movie, and other merchandising materials.

Much of these documents have been scanned and available on the internet, but no one (that I’ve seen) has assembled them together to see what items were available at the time the CJ-5 launched.

So, consider this a draft towards that goal, as I still have some more scanning and locating of documents so I can interlink everything together.

To begin, here is one of the earliest examples of the Kaiser Willys team creating a standardized family of similar brochures that highlight each of the models. Nearly all the first wave of documents were created in 1954. How do we know this? Because the January 1955 Kaiser Willys Sales and Dealer News highlighted these merchandising aides:

1955-01-kwnews-pg8-lores

Note that other brochures mentioned in this Kaiser Willys Newspaper include the upcoming  Jeep in Public Service (24 pages), the Jeep in Industry (24 pages, might have ended up this one?), and the Jeep in Agriculture (unclear to me which this is). I do have the brochure shown in the lower right, but it’s in Spanish. So, we can conclude that those were all published in 1955 (there are no publish dates on them).

Here’s an order form from 1955. It’s form numbers for the ‘vehicle folder’ brochures match those shown in the photo below this order form.

1954-merchandising-material-order-form-lores

Here’s a photo from an ebay post that shows all the vehicle ‘folder’ brochures together (the form numbers I have for the vehicle brochures below match the numbers on the order form above). I only have 7 of the 10 brochures, or I’d take a photo of my own like this.

1950s-willys-motors-equipment-catalog3

Form #s for 9 of the brochures in the pic above, and one not included (w-221-6): CJ-5 (W-239-5), CJ-3B (W-201-5), 1 Ton Truck (W-205-5), 4WD Station Wagon (W-221-5) (see W-221-4 here), 4WD Sedan Deliver (W-227-5), 2WD Utility Wagon (M-221-6), Cargo Personnel Carrier (W-215-5), 4WD Field Ambulance (W-228-5), 4WD Utility Ambulance (W-230-5), Jeep Fire Engine (W-229-5), and the Commando Fire Truck (W-240-5).

Below are some various brochure covers from the twenty-plus page brochures ….. (Note, one promotional document not listed in the order form was the Willys Story, 1950-1954).

1954 Willys 4-Wheel Drive Form W-1772:

Scannable Document

1954 Jeep Specialized Vehicles and Equipment, Spanish Version, No form or document number on the brochure:

1954-los-vehiculos-mas-utiles-del-mundo1

1955 updated version of the Willys Specialized Vehicles and Equipment Brochure (again, does not have a Form #):

jeep-specialized-vehicles-and-equipment-brochure1-lores

1955 Willys Jeep in Public Service, Form W-991-5:

1955 Jeep Vehicles and Equipment Cut Costs, Form W-992-5 (will have better scans of this one soon) … (also discussed in an article here):

1954-willys-jeep-in-industry-brochure4

Here are some of the mailing brochures, but without identifying form numbers, I am not 100% positive these are correct …..

Farmer and Ranchers Best Investment: Whatever You Grow for Profit

1954-w993-5-no-matter-what-you-grow-for-profit-1-lores

Earth Moving Equipment:

1955-earth-moving-equipment-mailer1 1955-earth-moving-equipment-mailer2

Power Producing Equipment:

1955-power-producing-equipment-mailer1-lores 1955-power-producing-equipment-mailer2-lores

Jeep-A-Trench:

1955-jeep-a-trench-mailer1-lores 1955-jeep-a-trench-mailer2-lores 1955-jeep-a-trench-mailer3-lores

Service Station (Mr. Service):

1955-service-station-mr-service-mailer-1

They Go Through: Form W-1765

wagon-brochure-w1765-1

By the end of 1955 there was a new round of brochures, but I don’t have the post researched yet, so there will be a delay of a few days.

 

 

 

4 Comments on “1953-1955 Kaiser’s Attempt to Standardize Marketing

  1. Godfre Ray King

    of course they tow a willys aero car in the movie , thing was brand new ! 4 door lark or a falcon ?

  2. Bob

    A couple things stuck me. First, that line of Jeeps coming over that little rise, I thought the trencher was going to snap that jeep in half! Secondly I don’t think I ever seen footage of one of those truck troop carriers, so that was very cool to see.

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