Featured: Premium-quality soda fountain and soda pop signage plus the largest-ever offering of extremely rare Coca-Cola and Pepsi-Cola bottles, including prototypes and unique examples

DENVER, Pa., Aug. 11, 2025 /PRNewswire/ — On August 18-20, Morphy’s will serve up the latest edition of a perennial collector favorite: their colorful Soda Pop, Advertising & General Store Auction. With a production timeline that starts in the late 19th century, the three-day lineup is highlighted by a tremendous selection of rare antique Coca-Cola and Pepsi-Cola bottles, and premier soda fountain memorabilia from a time when the local soda shop or drug store was the place where everyone gathered to socialize over light refreshment.

In their earliest days, soda pop brands were fiercely competitive marketers, providing lavish ceramic syrup dispensers and colorful advertising signs to establishments where their products were sold. Examples of those innovative promotional items – including 650+ lots of Coca-Cola memorabilia – will be the objects of their own effervescent competition at Morphy’s, in a 1,780-offering that also includes signage publicizing ice cream, chewing gum and sweets; tobacco, alcoholic beverages, coffee and more. Adding entertainment value to an already exciting array of goods, the sale also features 42 classic radios, including Bakelite and Catalin productions; and more than two dozen gum-vending machines.

Bubbling to the top layer of auction highlights is a Hires Root Beer “Munimaker” salesman’s sample dispenser. It is realistically constructed from marble, glass and nickel, with a zinc liner and coils inside, just like its full-size counterpart. Its globe, which is emblazoned “Drink Hires / It is Pure,” is clean and undamaged. This incredible piece of soda pop history has been graded 8.75+ out of 10 and is estimated at $30,000–$60,000.

Every Coca-Cola collector knows the circa 1914-1916 single-sided cardboard sign depicting a Dutch boy in wooden clogs, running with an oversize stick of Coca-Cola Peppermint Pepsin Gum cradled in his three-dimensional articulated arm. Morphy’s will offer a large-size version of this sign, measuring 24½ inches tall by 18¼ inches wide, and in Excellent 8.25 condition. This extremely desirable sign is expected to make $20,000–$40,000.

The experts at AGS (Authentication & Grading Service) carefully examined a circa-1933 Coca-Cola double-sided porcelain sign with a Christmas bottle graphic and filigreed top and concluded it would be very difficult to find a better example. Marked Tennessee Enamel Mfg. Co. Nashville, this 24½inch by 21¾-inch sign is crisp and beautiful, and comes to auction with a $10,000–$20,000 estimate.

The August 18-20 auction also includes the largest selection of extremely rare, early Coca-Cola and Pepsi-Cola bottles ever to appear at auction. Many are one-of-a-kind or prototypes, coming from bottlers all over the USA. For example, this sale may represent the first time many soda pop collectors will have ever seen a “Pepsi Pepsi Pepsi” bottle. Embossed 18 times around its circumference with the brand name “Pepsi-Cola,” the bottle is thought to have originated in Greenville, SC. Assessed in 8.0 condition, this fascinating survivor is estimated at $6,000–$9,000.

Other noteworthy items include a large and impressive circa-1905 Pepsi-Cola cardboard sign with the image of “Miss Pepsi-Cola,” $10,000–$20,000; a reverse-painted and foil-under-glass sign reading “SODA FOUNTAIN & CONFECTIONS,” $4,000–$12,000; a Theo A Kochs salesman’s sample barber chair with red leather cushions, white porcelain, and chrome construction, $15,000–$30,000; and an elaborate circa-1890 Brainerd & Armstrong 2-piece spool cabinet whose unusual design incorporates a decorative marquee and clock, $4,000–$8,000.

All forms of bidding will be available, including absentee, by phone and live via the Internet through Morphy Live. Online: www.morphyauctions.com.

Media Contact:
Dan Morphy
877-968-8880, [email protected]

SOURCE Morphy Auctions