Chandy beer trays
Tin trays were popular advertising items with breweries and others during the 1950s to 1970s, when they were a common sight in pubs.
We now know that Chandy produced at least five different promotional beer trays during the 1960s and 1970s, examples of all of which we now have in our collection. Four of these are large (approximately 13" diameter) trays and one is a smaller (approximately 10" diameter) tray.
The earliest of the trays (shown above left) dates, we believe, from the early 1960s - an example of it can be seen pictured in the 1964 Chandy Showtime advert. This tray carries the small print "A Hancor Mitcham Product Harry E Tunnicliffe Ltd, London W.C.2", Harry E Tunnicliffe Ltd also being the manufacturer's name found on Chandy lion figurines.
© 2014-2024 Lewis Williams
The next earliest tray design (with the slogan 'Cheers for Chandy') was we now know (see curator's blog post 1st March 2015) used on two sizes of beer trays as pictured. These trays have in small print "Printed in England by Reginald Corfield Ltd". Reginald Corfield Ltd were specialists in printing on metal as well as the people behind the Regicor brand that appeared on a large number of ceramic advertising items produced by Wade Pottery in the 1950s and 1960s.
The next tray design (below bottom left) adopts Chandy’s controversial “Drink and drive/Drink Chandy drive” slogan (more on that here) and dates from, we believe, circa 1969 and finally the “Ch Ch Chandy the thirst two letters are important” design tray (below bottom right) is the most modern of the trays and dates from the early 1970s.