Remembering Our Anniversary

Today is our 12th wedding anniversary.  Last year I posted about the cruise to the Bahamas we took for our 11th anniversary and the few cans that came back with us from the trip.  One of them was the controversial 2011 white "Arctic Home" Coca-Cola can.

Coca-Cola 2011 Holiday can

During one of the shows aboard the cruise ship (on Nov 12), the couple we were sitting with was enjoying the show with a 6-pack of Coke and a bottle of whiskey.  My eyes were all over the white Coke cans and I finally broke down and asked him if I could have one.  Of course he didn't mind at all.  So I carried that can with me from the ship to the hotel to the airport and back home.  When we got home I wrote the date 11-12-11 on the bottom of it to remind me when I got it.

It wasn't long before those cans showed up at stores in my area and a Coke-drinking co-worker brought in a 12-pack of them.  So I was able to bottom-open one for my collection.  I've replaced top-opened cans with bottom-opened cans before and I always put the unneeded top-opened ones in my trade pile.  But in this case, I had to keep the top-opened white Coke can from our cruise.

So as of this post, it's the only can I've kept both top- and bottom-opened versions of. 

And I thank my wife for putting up with my cans for a year and a half now and I hope she can put up with them for many years to come. 

Family Pictures

A few months ago we realized we haven't had family pictures taken for a couple of years.  But instead of going to Olan Mills or Sears or even Walmart, we had my photographer cousin come over for several hours one Saturday last month to take our pictures inside our house, outside the house and even at my in-laws' house out in the country.

As we posed at the piano, the dining room table and even on the couch with X-box controllers in hand, I suggested we take a few pics to reflect my other hobby... can collecting.  So we headed to the basement.

I was only able to get a few pictures taken with the wife before she mysteriously disappeared.  So then I was on my own for a few pics.

And my son, "Lil Pepper", had to ham it up a bit.

Needless to say, none of these will be on the front of our Christmas card this year, but it's still a memorable moment captured in time. 

Return of the Polar Bears

Last week, my wife and I saw a lady sitting next to us in traffic.  I noticed the lady was drinking a red can of Coke with polar bears on it.  I told my wife, "She's drinking a soda that's almost a year old!"  But then I thought about it and realized soda can last quite a while in a can, so the incident left my mind.

Until today when a co-worker brought in a new 12-pack of Coke to work.  He commented that the polar bears were back.  I asked to look at the can to see if they changed the design from last year.  Initially it looked the same, then I saw the 2012 copyright date.  It actually was a new can.  And then I noticed the bears are different.

2011

2012

The 2012 holiday cans have arrived.  Now I'll be watching for the other Coke product variations.

I guess the lady in traffic wasn't drinking an old can of soda but a brand new can.  She fooled me.

How I "Process" A New Can

If I had to take pictures of my 2200+ cans now and do an inventory, it would not get done!  Fortunately I started my web site and catalog when I started collecting and I update both as I get new cans.  So what is the process of adding a can to my collection?  Read on.

For this post's example, I will be using the Diet Dr Pepper can featuring another tuition winner, Antron McCullough, that I found this morning at the local Dollar General store.

The first thing I do is bottom open the can using a hammer and nail.  I put two holes in the bottom, one to allow the soda to drain and one to allow air to go in (notice both holes in the pic below.)  And then I drain the can. 

Once the can is empty, I wash it off and set it on the island in my kitchen to take its picture for the web site.  Every can picture on the site has been taken in this exact spot using the same two CD's to prop the same camera up so every picture is taken at the same level.  I appreciate consistency. 

Then I head to the computer to add the can to my master Can List, which is an Excel file.  The data recorded for each can is the date I got the can, the manufacturer, the brand, the variation (flavor or can design), condition (which is for steel cans describing whether they are straight steel, extruded, etc and what kind of tabs they have), where I got the can, its assigned catalog # and any special notes.

I've highlight today's can in the screenshot above.  Its catalog # is DP01d-20.  And here's what that means.  The first two letters tell me which major manufacturer made the soda.  Examples are DP for Dr Pepper Snapple Group, CC for Coca-Cola, PE for PepsiCo, etc.  The two numbers following the letters tell me which brand of soda it is.  So in my Dr Pepper Snapple Group brand list, 01=Dr Pepper, 02=7 Up, 03=A&W, etc.  And if it's a diet version, I tack on the little "d" after the brand number.  So by looking at DP01d, I know this is a Diet Dr Pepper can.  So which Diet Dr Pepper is it?  #20, the number following the dash in the catalog #.  Looking at the chart above, you can see all of my Diet Dr Peppers listed.  You can also see my newer Dr Peppers and oldest 7Up's on the chart too.  It took a while for me to tweak the catalog # system, but it works for me.  Each can has its own unique number and by looking at that number I know exactly what can it is!

In the case of this can, I had to take two pictures, one of the front and one of the back.  I used Paint Shop Pro photo editing software to combine both pictures and added that pic to the Dr Pepper Special Promos page on the collection web site.

And then the fun part... I add the can to the shelf.

And in this case, Antron now sits with the other three tuition winners I've collected so far in my Dr Pepper section.

So, anyone need an Antron can?  I have five extras!!!

Another Day, Another Flea Market

My wife and I spent another day at another flea market and a dozen antique shops yesterday.  The first soda can find was an old cone top Pepsi can.  They were asking $75 for it but I'm not ready to take that big of a step for my collection yet.  I'll stick to the tabbed cans for now.

It can be frustrating searching for soda cans because I don't see very many at these places.  But there are TONS of bottles and beer cans. 

I did find a couple of Coke cans but they were sports-related and I'm just not into sports (despite yesterday's post about RC baseball cans.)  Plus they were wanting $5 a piece for them and they just aren't worth that to me.

But in the end, I did manage to find an aluminum bottle I didn't have yet.

I also found a kitschy statue of a Japanese person (I set it next to my new aluminum bottle to demonstrate its size.)

 

I'm not sure which my wife is more displeased with; another can in the house or the "hideous" treasure I found.

RC Baseball

Last weekend my mother-in-law called from a flea market where she found a guy selling RC cans with baseball players on them.  I told her there were two sets; one was from 1977 and had the players' stats/info in a square text box and the other set was from 1978 and had the stats/info printed on a picture of a baseball.

I pulled up my can collection website and had her start reading off the names of the cans he had.  In the end, he had ten cans that I didn't.

 

 

But I have them now.

I am in no hurry to complete these two sets.  I now have 15 of the 70 cans from 1977 and I have 54 of the 100 cans from the 1978 set.  It's a slow process, but hopefully someday I'll have complete collections from both years.

Gold Yoda and Storm

While on a recent flea market and antique mall road trip, my wife and I checked out a shop in Washington, Indiana.  I was drooling over the vast selection of boarded Star Wars figures when she found me and said there were a lot of soda cans near the back of the store.  So I made my way there and found this:

It was a selection of cans from the 1999 Pepsi Star Wars Episode One 24-can set.  Since I already have the set, most of the cans didn't interest me.  Except for two.  Buried among the bright blue and white cans was a gold can.  I picked it up and realized I was holding the rare 25th can... the Gold Yoda!  I've seen these go for $20 and more on eBay and just wasn't willing to spend that much.  I knew I would eventually come across it in my travels.  The next question was "how much?"  I turned the unopened can over and saw a tag for $5.  It was mine!!!

Also in the pile was a Jar Jar Binks can I had never seen.  It was a Pepsi Storm can!  What the what?  So I bought it for $1.  I researched it when we got home and found out Storm was Pepsi's 1998-1999 attempt at a lightly carbonated, caffeinated lemon-lime drink.  Since this was being tested during their Star Wars campaign, they released a Storm and Light Storm Star Wars can (those two cans were not numbered since they weren't part of the main 24-can set).  Storm never made it out of the test market.  It was dropped in favor of Pepsi's caffeine-free Slice, which was reformulated and renamed Sierra Mist in 2000.

Yoda is famous for saying, "Do or do not, there is not try."  Well I didn't just "try" to get the gold Yoda, I went out and "did"!!! 

Mountain Dew Green Label

In 2007 Mountain Dew released a small line of limited edition aluminum bottles featuring artwork from a range of artists (including tattoo artists) called Green Label.  From the information I have found, they continued the aluminum bottles for just a couple of years.  If they still produce them, please leave a comment and let me know.

I was aware Mountain Dew had cool-looking aluminum bottles, but it wasn't until last weekend that I finally saw one in person at a flea market in Evansville, Indiana.  The booth had two of the same design, but one had a dent in the side.  They both had $1 price tags, so I grabbed the nicer of the two and started my Mountain Dew Green Label collection.

This bottle is called "Reflections of Dew" from 2008

I am staying away from glass bottles because I do NOT need another "wing" of my collection, but I have grandfathered these in because they are made of aluminum.  I will not go to eBay and start buying all the Green Labels I can find (not yet, at least), but I will continue to look for them to pop up in antique malls and flea markets.

Burnt Prairie Trashed Cans

The first antique shop my wife and I visited on our recent vacation was called Burnt Prairie Antique Mall.  As we walked in the door, I noticed a large cardboard container that said "Please recycle" and it was full of cans!  A quick glance inside revealed a couple of cans I didn't have...

Later, while paying for the things we bought, I mentioned to the cashier lady I had a can collection.  I said we weren't from the area and I noticed a couple of cans in the recycle box that I didn't have.  She handed me a plastic bag and cheerfully said, "Take what you want."

I really wanted to dig in deep, but I was already getting stares from a few other shoppers, so I just casually perused the selection at the top of the heap.  I found a Diet Pepsi can and a Mtn Dew can both with an ad/coupon for Holiday World.  I also found two more Dr Pepper tuition winner cans, bringing the total in my collection to three now.

My vacation was off to a good start!!!

Home from Vacation

My wife and I got home from a short vacation today.  We took a road trip around southern Indiana and southern Illinois going to various flea markets and antique shops.  This was my two-day take.

Among the "treasures" I found was a gold Yoda can, a cool Mountain Dew aluminum bottle, a couple more Dr Pepper tuition cans and many more! 

I hope to highlight some of these finds in detail in the next week or two.

Another Birthday in the Can

I recently had another birthday.  One of the presents my wife gave me was this Monster Energy can (I drank it today at work.)

 

What's so special about it?  Well, it's a can that I didn't have.  AND the fact that my wife, who would rather cash in my collection at a recycler for a trip to Bath & Body Works, gave it to me!  It was a happy birthday.

Fright Fest

2010

My favorite month of the year is here.  October is when all the ghosts come out and things get spook and creepy.  And if I could only go to Six Flags one time each year it would be during their Fright Fest.  And so I've begun a sub-collection of Coca-Cola discount cans for Fright Fest. 

2011

Halloween 2011 was the first Halloween since I started my can collection so it was easy to get the 2011 can.  And I lucked out and found a 2010 can at work in April of last year.  And now the 2012 can has been released, so I snatched it up when I saw one at work last week.

The 2010 and 2011 ads were printed on a black background which I prefer over 2012's silver background.  The black background takes better pictures. 

2012

It'll be easy to collect a can each year from now on, but it will be a challenge to find the cans from 2009 and earlier.  I'm not in full-search mode but if I stumble upon them I'll certainly add them to my collection. 

Dr Pepper Winners

A couple of days ago a co-worker brought this Dr Pepper can to me.

 

When I saw the can, I had the same expression as Courtney, haha.  I love seeing a new can that I didn't know existed.  Last year Dr Pepper had a can set showing scholarship winners so I'm assuming this is something like that.  I haven't done any research yet but I think they have some kind of tuition contest going on.  And I don't know how many cans are in the set yet.

So I'll keep an eye out for more excited people on the sides of cans.

10-14-12 update -  A couple of days ago I found the following two Dr Pepper cans in the trash at an antique mall:

 

Watching for can #4...

 11-01-12 update - I found this one at the local Dollar General store:

12-10-12 update - I found this one at the same local Dollar General store:

12-18-12 update - I found this one at the same local Dollar General store:

A Hard Thing to Do

So I have my "A" cans which are in my main collection.  And then I have my "B" cans which are on shelves in the garage.  They are my doubles and are used for trades.  And then there are the "C" cans which are basically doubles of my doubles.  Ok, I have a hard time getting rid of cans.

Today, for the first time in the year and a half I've been collecting, I pulled out some cans to get rid of.

These are basically some of my "C" cans.  The good thing is now I have room on my trade shelves for more "B" cans.  And when someone visits my site to check out the trade cans they won't have to weed through the doubles that were there (I will update the trade can pics soon).

I don't like getting rid of the cans because I feel there is a collector somewhere that would love to have them.  When I began, I would have given anything for two trash bags full of cans!!!

But these are going to a good cause.  The cans are going to a recycle project the students are doing at the school where my wife works.  Eventually the cans will be recycled and the money will go towards books for their library. 

Even with all of those pluses, it's still a hard thing to do.

A Spur-of-the-Moment Shopping Success

This afternoon I was in the neighborhood of a couple of stores that have "cheap" drinks, so I decided to drop in to see if they had any cans I needed.  And boy, did they!

All of this for a tad over $10.  Not bad for one day's work.

Cherry Lime Rickey

A couple of months ago I read about 2012 being AriZona tea's 20th anniversary.  So they had a contest for their "customers" (I guess that's what the people who drink AriZona are called) to pick the anniversary flavor and design the anniversary can.  But there was one caveat, the can would be available exclusively at 7-Eleven stores.

On the way to work today, I decided to see if there were any 7-Elevens around me.  I found one about 4 blocks from where I work (in a direction I normally don't travel, that's why I didn't know it was there).  I called and asked if they had the flavor and they said, "We sure do."

 

And now the can is in my collection.  And I have to say I love this can design.  Just looking at it makes me want to drink it!  And the flavor sounds excellent.  One of the coolest things about the can is the matte white top.

 

I haven't opened it yet to taste it, I'll save that for an upcoming episode of my taste-test podcast.  But at this point I will give this product a preliminary grade of A+.

Green Mountain

Last month a visitor to my site contacted me and asked if I knew anything about this Green Mountain can.

 I searched the internet and couldn't find much information.  I did find a site that said the can is from Minnesota. 

Another site listed it as a citrus flavored soda.  That site dated the can to 1979.

It's a crimped steel can with a tab top.  And the canning information on the side says it was produced by Contract Beverage Inc.

So if anyone has any additional info, please post a comment.  Thanks!!!

The Fluted Can

During a recent visit to an antique mall, I found a few interesting cans.  Here is one of them.

The can was some kind of promo can from American National Can for their new fluted can design.  See the can pic below for a list of advantages of their life-changing cans.

I couldn't tell how well the flute design was coming through in the pics, so I took another pic to try to show the ribs along the can.

I like how the can says it's "The can of the future... consumers prefer it!"  My only question is how many of you have even heard of a fluted can?  I guess it wasn't such a big hit after all.

You Won A Watch!

Without cap

With cap

Last weekend at an antique mall, I found a few interesting soda cans.

The first can I want to post about is a Red Creme Barq's can that had a black cap on it resembling a hollowed out hockey puck.  I took the cap off and the can had no lid on top of it.  And then I read the cap.  Apparently at one point they had a contest where you could instantly win a digital watch.

Inside the can was a thick cardboard roll that made the can feel about the weight of a full soda can.  I don't know if the cans were hidden inside 12-packs or in vending machines (probably the former).  

The only thing that would have made this can better is if the watch had still been with it.  I have searched all over the internet and can't find anything about the contest.  And so far I've been unable to date the can.

They also had a regular Barq's can that was a winner, but since I had that design already I just bought this Red Creme can.  Now I wish I had picked up both of them.

If you have any info about this can/contest, please post a comment.  Thanks!!!

10/24/12 update - BeerCanRich99, someone I've traded cans with in the past, found a picture of the Barq's watch.  Thanks BCR99!