So here is another nice advertisement on the Ericofon in the 1970’s. It is always nice to have some historical pictures to share.
After my spectacular buy of the Touch Tone prototype in July there is no news on my collection. As far as I’m aware the only ‘official’ model missing for me is the Gray Touch Tone. So much additions will not be expected anymore. But… you never know what will pop up!
Some pictures which give a glimpse on the production process of the Ericofon in the past. The source is the Ericsson archive.
A few Dutch advertisements on the Ericofon dating back to 1960.
It was 18 years later that the Ericofon was introduced in The Netherlands.
Below are some design drawings of the model 700 which was sold as of 1976. My guess is that the drawings were made before 1976 as the bodies are very close to the final shape but not exactly the same. It is a nice colorful set of sketches.
At this moment it is cold in The Netherlands as it is mid winter. Nevertheless there is a message from a very sunny part of our kingdom below: Curaçao.
In the newspaper Amigoe of December 12th 1986 I have found this advertisement. An Ericofon 700 as an end year offer for half the price; available in the colors orange, blue, white and green (not in brown, to make the series complete).
Remarkable detail is that the Ericofon 700 was never sold in The Netherlands nor in the US, but Curaçao is part of the Dutch kingdom and very close to and oriented towards the US. Obviously the telecom operator at that time, Setel, still marketed this model on the small island with ~150K inhabitants at that time.
Let’s talk about the color pink.
First of all we have 4 different colors of pink: Dusty Rose, Riviera, Princess Pink and Petal Pink. There is an interesting story on the latter two, Princess and Petal Pink.
In the beginning there was a color named Princess Pink. It sounds like the beginning of a fairy tale, but no prince is expected to drop in here. And it does not turn out too good in the end for this this American princess. The color palette in the USA, where she was part of, consisted of 18 different colors as you can see in this previous post. Petal Pink did not yet exist at this time.
In the early 1960’s (~1961) it was decided that North Electric could produce all Ericofons for the US market. One year before (~1960) the New Case was introduced. At this time it was also decided that the US color palette was to be reduced from 18 to 8 colors. Ten colors disappeared but Princess Pink was swapped out by her new rival Petal Pink. Petal even stole Princess’ color code (520541). This code is now applicable for both colors…
There could be different reasons for this swap of pink that took place. Maybe the Princess Pink was not such a popular color. This is most likely also the reason of 10 colors disappearing. Or it was to avoid confusion with the Bell System “Princess phone” marketed by Western Electric, which was getting popular as well at that time.
So the result of this story is that the following models are available: Petal Pink in only New Case (both, flat and wedge). There was never an Old Case produced as the swap was done the moment new cases already existed. Princess Pink exists in all 3 cases. But the New Case (wedge) not from US production, only from other markets (e.g. Sweden). From both colors there is also a Touch Tone version available.
If you ask me, my favorite is the Princess. Petal is the bad stepmother.
The poster below is kind of legendary. It reflects the North Electric color palette that was marketed by North Electric in the heyday of the Ericofon in the United States. The color palette in other countries was much more limited.
As you can see the 18 different colors are all old cases. In a later stage this model was replaced by a new case shell. But not all colors survived this change in the United States as the palette was reduced to 8 colors. E.g. the Charcoal only exists in old case. Princess Pink was replaced with Petal Pink in the United States but survived outside in various models.
Some other colors survived the first new case, but not the second e.g. Nordic Blue, Dusty Rose, Chartreuse, Accent Green, Riviera and Royal Dubonnet.
The godfathers of the Ericofon…
Gösta Thames (1916 – 2006): was the highest technical manager in Ericsson. He took Lysell on board in 1939 and in the late 1940’s he was the leader of the design team for the Ericofon.
Ralph Lysell (1907 – 1987) is one of the true pioneers in Swedish industrial design. He was engaged in 1939 in the design process but left Ericsson in 1949. He was still involved after 1949 in the Ericofon design as he was a master in clay modelling.
Hugo Blomberg (1897 – 1994) was in charge of the Ericofons technical development as of 1949. Hired Lysell as a freelance designer for his extraordinary design skills.
As I already showed some time ago in an older post, there is a stamp that has the Ericofon on it. Recently I was able to get a first day cover of this stamp from 1999. It is a nice to have, and worth sharing here, but not something really special.
Something more special, and with a bit more history is the first day cover below. This one I like a lot.
This envelop, with the Ericofon as an image on the envelope itself, was send in December 1962 from Tunesia to Sweden. So the First Day Cover is in fact about the series of stamps on the envelope. But…
…the receiver of the envelope was the General Director of the Swedish Post Office between 1947 and 1964, Erik Swartling.
The sender must be Ericsson Tunesia. Actually I did not open the envelope, as it is sealed, but inside there is a note with some text that you can read if you keep it against the light. It says “Good Wishes For The Next Year” and “Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson”. It also shows the LM Ericsson logo on the note inside. Unfortunately I am not able to read more of the note…
I really have to control myself not opening it. But as Erik obviously never opened it, who am I to do so… ?
These are quite a bunch of very very rare Ericofons you see here. Unfortunately they are not mine. 🙁 I am not aware of the origin of these picture, but if it is your set of Ericofons, please contact me, as I found them on social media.
These are so called ‘swirl’ types. They were never officially produced. But they were obviously the result of moving from one color to another in the production process.
It seems that when they were producing red Ericofons for instance, and they wanted to start producing whites, the colors could mix in the machine. A few models would have these effects during that switch. Usually they were thrown away, but I am pretty sure that these phone were so cool that you just had to smuggle them out.
What I find strange, is that the cap also has the same effect. I always thought the caps would be produced separately. Or… they just produced both more or less in the same production line, at the same time. Or… they had to look for a cap somewhere… I don’t know.
They are gorgeous!