100 Years Fresh
May 2020 marks 100 years in business for AJ Baker & Sons, a significant achievement and milestone. We are a proudly Western Australian owned and operated family business, with offices spanning across Australia.
Starting as a
general mercantile business back in 1920, AJ Baker is now one of the most
successful privately owned refrigeration contractors in Australia. We pride
ourselves on providing our customers with top of the line products, sourced
both locally and internationally.
We have spent the
start of 2020 working with the fabulous Shannon Lovelady, Historian, Archivist
& Curator at the Museum of Perth documenting and digitising our company
archives and working alongside Peter and Mike Baker to uncover both the Baker
business and family history.
Albert John Baker
was a fabulous record keeper and we have discovered some amazing advertising
campaigns from the 1930’s which we are super excited to start sharing with you
and photos with some brands that are still trading today.
As for our
Birthday party, we will review this when the time is right, in the meantime we
hope you enjoy some of the amazing items we have uncovered.
The team at AJ
Baker & Sons.
100 Years Fresh - Airtemp
22 May 2020
While digitising our archives with the Museum of Perth we have
found an array of not just amazing photographs but also some advertising
brochures that were used in the 1950's. We found an entire design file of
perfectly filed flyers.
This is Chrysler Australia
Limited, Airtemp Division brochure was aimed at commercial businesses such as restaurants,
convenience stores and nightclubs.
We located this information on the Allparcom website:
“The Airtemp brand is the result of the air-conditioning system designed for
the Art Deco style Chrysler building in New York City. When completed in 1930,
the skyscraper was the world's tallest building. Four years later, with their
acquired climate conditioning expertise, Airtemp Corporation was born.”
Thank you to Allparcom for that fun fact.
Mid-1950s brochures!
18 May 2020
In 1953, Kelvinator appointed A J Baker & Sons as the WA distributor for Leonard refrigerators.
Did you know Charles Leonard, an ice box manufacturer from Grand Rapids, Michigan, had a refrigeration mishap in his own home which led to one of his greatest inventions? In 1881 someone put a bucket of hot lard in their ice box, on top of the ice, to cool. The result was melted ice, spilt lard and an utterly horrendous clean-up!
Leonard soon invented his famous ‘Cleanable’ Refrigerator with removable liners and flues that readily could be taken out and cleaned. Thanks to AMC Kelvinator History for that fun fact.
Gallery
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100 years in Business
08 May 2020
We are on the search for some of our original Baker
nameplates.
They are brass engraved plates with black fill, unfortunately the company who originally made the engraved nameplates is no longer in business. We have put the call out to the public to help us celebrate
100 years of business in Australia!
We believe there are a few circulating, if you have a set of Avery scales, an Amat-Ice unit,
or a 1940's to 1960's era refrigerator, could you please have a look for us and
see if it’s a Baker model.
Head to our social media pages and share the story from there if you like.
Images:
- AJ Baker Manufactured Refrigerator: 1952
- Avery House Showroom 480 Hay Street, Perth: 1931
- Restored Compressor: 1942
Gallery
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Celebrating 100 Years Fresh
01 May 2020
May 2020 marks 100 Years in business for AJ Baker & Sons, a milestone we are very proud of.
We will be sharing all of the material we have uncovered on this page for those that don't use social media.
Be sure to add the page to your bookmarks to follow along.
We hope you enjoy.
Gallery
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