Mark’s Favorite Lost Canadian Brands

Canadian writer Mark Shainblum, an Ottawa, Ontario journalist and editor, is best known as a science fiction and comic book writer. He sends us his his top favorite missing Canadian brands. The cartoonist was quite stunned to hear that Crosley Radios is back, and found our site that way. Here goes:

  1. Supertest Gasoline, a company I remember well from my childhood. It’s long gone, but the trademark still belongs to the Canadian petroleum giant Petro-Canada.
  2. B/A gas stations, which were eventually absorbed by Gulf, which in Canada were eventually absorbed by BP, which were eventually absorbed by Petro-Canada.
  3. Eaton’s department stores, a Canadian retailing landmark, which collapsed ignominiously in the 1990’s because they couldn’t keep up in a Wal-Mart world. And Wal-Mart hadn’t even come to Canada yet!
  4. Consumer’s Distributing, a catalogue/showroom retailer where I bought almost every small appliance, electronic doodad, camera accessory, typewriter and small piece of furniture I owned before about 1988.
  5. Steinberg’s and Miracle Mart, a twin chain of supermarkets and junior department stores in Quebec and Ontario. Circa 1920 till the early 90’s.
  6. No, not those Simpsons, although the logo does look eerily similar, now that I think about it. Simpsons was another major Canadian department store chain, Eaton’s major competitor, which collapsed and was absorbed by the Hudson’s Bay Company and shut down thereafter
  7. KIK Cola, a Canadian-only brand which frankly tasted awful, but was dutifully purchased by my parents.
  8. Sealtest Milk. This brand actually still exists, now owned by the Natrel Group, but it’s only sold in Ontario and BC, not my part of the country.
  9. Borden Milk. I think this brand still exists in other parts of the world, but is long gone here, as are the glass bottles with the cardboard stopper it came in.

Author

  • Garland Pollard

    J. Garland Pollard IV is editor/publisher of BrandlandUSA. Since 2006, the website BrandlandUSA.com has chronicled the history and business of America’s great brands.

3 Comments

  1. Pascale’s hardware store has also disappeared, as has Steinberg’s grocery store. Perette’s (unsure of the spelling) convenience store.

  2. Have a look at my elementary paintings of food stores in Montreal from the 1930’s on, many featuring “exinct” signs and logos from the food industry.My old store logo,Jeeves the butler of the BUYWELL chain in Montreal, was designed, (so the legend/myth goes) was designed in the 1920’s by a class mate of Walt Disney in art classes.

  3. I’m pretty sure that we still get Borden Milk down here in Michigan. Though I haven’t bought it in years, so I could be thinking about the same time period that you are. Which wouldn’t make this comment helpful at all.

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