The Allstate, a Henry J in mild disguise, was a homely little thing. Read all about Sears’s rare failure it here.
Vintage PR Shot: 1952 Allstate – Trying Hard To Distract The Viewer
– Posted on March 7, 2022
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Curbside Classics Archives
No one said it was ugly when they were new
It makes no sense. Not that PR photos are supposed to.
Why are they waving at each other? One usually waves at a person when they are too far away to speak comfortably.
The gal in the foreground is wearing a proto-Playboy bunny outfit. Playboy wouldn’t appear for another year.
The gal on the left is wearing a period-appropriate swimsuit, but her friend is wearing stockings, so she’s clearly not going swimming. (maybe she’s not wearing stockings; could be an airbrush job.)
Sense. This makes none.
I don’t think it’s ugly now. But in an early 1950s aspirational world the HenryJ, by marketing to the lower classes, went against the popular way of thinking and dragged the Allstate down with it. What self-respect ING American of even modest but hopeful means would want something so small and cheap when, “for only a few dollars more a month,” (s)he could have a REAL car like a Ford or Chevy?
That, and Sears not being able or knowing how to efficiently accommodate trade-ins.
That era was probably pretty much Peak Sears, as the linked article mentions a space alien with a sufficient budget could walk into a Sears catalog store and buy or order just about everything needed for a midcentury middle-class American lifestyle except a plot of land for the house to sit on.
They probably would’ve gotten the kinks of a trade-in system worked out, eventually, if the Allstate experiment hadn’t come into the same one-two punch of the Korean War material restrictions followed by a Ford-Chevy price war as soon as they were lifted that affected all the other independents and especially their economy car programs.
Sears never sold a plot of land to build a house on, but they did sell the actual house (in kit form) for several decades, usually cited as about 1908-1940 though there were some built shortly after the war as well.
Yes, I really miss the old Sears, though much of what I miss are attributes that don’t exist in any retailer anywhere anymore…for me getting replacement parts to nurse my hobby of fixing things. Of course, that doesn’t help sell many replacement new items, that’s why no one wants you trying to fix them anymore…so not selling replacement parts is better business (but I think of this as “short-term” marketing). The problem…I can’t see how this squares with the so called environmental movement when they seem to prefer people discard broken items rather than fixing them…to me, the best “recycling” is being able to keep a workable item functioning rather than buying a replacement in the first place, though I’ll admit it doesn’t do much for the bottom line of a retailer.
Probably swimming upstream, but that’s what I mostly admired about Sears, when they became more of a “me too” retailer and abandoned offering spare parts is what made them more irrelevant to me. If they backed me by offering spare parts, I figured I’d back them by giving them my business in “soft” items (clothing….go through a lot of it when you stain and rip when fixing your “hard” items…maybe not the height of fashion, but I’d try to buy mine at Sears as much as I could…even bought laundry detergent and other stuff. Yes, if Sears offered me a car for sale I’d prefer to buy it through them, rather than through my local “Henry J” dealer. Good for me…good for Sears…think this is kind of a “win-win” even if I didn’t end up buying multiple lawn mowers (or whatever other item)…they’d get my business in other ways, and I would keep coming back since they earned my loyalty.
My Dad would offer the only exception I can think of to this…in 1967 he bought us new bicycles from Sears…I still have my sister’s Spaceliner (designed by Vicktor Schreckengost)…they ripped the headliner when putting them in the back of his ’65 Olds F85, when they found out he had Allstate insurance, rather than have the store pay, they charged the repair to my Dad’s insurance. He refused to even consider buying Allstate insurance the rest of his life (he died 6 years ago). But the bicycles themselves were great…well made, great design, something we came to expect from Sears, maybe the lure of “low cost” items did them in, but I think in the end the total cost is higher since new items are only designed for replacement rather than repair (and the landfills fill up from the cast-offs).
Yes, for my family Sears was “the” store for many years…wish someone still could do business the way they did.
The ladies are becoming recurring regulars! Not that I mind, maybe this time I’ll notice the car, which seems to me, someone who was not around in ’52 or regularly sees early ’50s cars, not terrible.
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/vintage-ads-and-brochures/vintage-ad-1952-allstate-trying-to-distract-from-that-dumpy-car/
Perhaps this is analagous to today’s Mitsubishi Mirage, which seems to go fine, is inexpensive, but perhaps styled a little unimaginatively. Then again that one is/was selling quite well, or at least enough to make the manufacturer happy.
Chevy has cancelled the Spark for ’23. Mirage sales will go through the roof, largely going to rental-car fleets for the low-end option.
With gas prices headed toward $5 a gallon and higher I think that the Mirage is going to be gaining respect quick.
The girl on the right is specifically hiding the fastback, which was out of style then. If you aren’t looking carefully, you’d think it was a modern three-box car.
I don’t think I’d have likes the looks of this when it was new .
Cheesecake always helps to sell lower end products .
-Nate
I have an early memory of seeing an Allstate in the 21st Street Sears in Norfolk Virginia.. I read that the major difference between the Henry J and Allstate was that the Allstate had no trunk lid, storage was behind the back seat
Regarding Evan’s remark, in addition to promoting the Allstate a/k/a Henry J car, the ladies were promoting Revlon Hi and Dri! Yours in mirth (and my girth) Tom