# Jewel Tea **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [April 1, 2015, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jewel-tea/716496 "2015-04-01T14:23:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Zeldar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b77776/32.png) [@Zeldar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeldar)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2019, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jewel-tea/716496/21 "2019-02-25T21:18:34Z")
Thanks much, **kenobi 65**. ---
**Author:** ![Icarus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/icarus/32/72_2.png) [@Icarus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Icarus)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2019, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jewel-tea/716496/22 "2019-02-25T21:34:40Z")
As a child of the 60’s in a small town in the mid-west I remember the Jewel Tea man visiting, and the Avon Lady with those bottles of after shave shaped like everything under the sun. My mother became an Avon Lady and was quite successful at it. She had cabinets full of all of the annual promotional awards for hitting sales and recruiting targets. She continued until she couldn’t handle it any more just a few years ago. Where I worked up until the late 90’s we had Charles Chips deliveries. It was handy to buy a bunch of snacks for the office, and to take home, if you were so inclined. This was in an office in Los Angeles. Around the time I left there, the lady who owned the route was trying to sell it so she could move on to other things. As for Schwann’s, we’ve ordered from them for dad for years. We used to get stuff for ourselves too, until a couple of years ago - we still get the catalog. But we have moved on to the more current food delivery options (pre-made and you-cook-em). ---
**Author:** ![CharmaChameleon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9d8465/32.png) [@CharmaChameleon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CharmaChameleon)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2019, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jewel-tea/716496/23 "2019-02-25T22:35:41Z")
The only three I remember, regarding route-sold foodstuffs, are (1) Standard Coffee and (2) Chase & Sanborn, both in the 50s-60s, and (3) Charles Chips, in the '60s-'80s. Otherwise there was Snap-on Tools. ---
**Author:** ![Helena330](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/helena330/32/531_2.png) [@Helena330](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Helena330)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2019, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jewel-tea/716496/24 "2019-02-25T23:30:27Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > I knew that the Chicago-based Jewel grocery store chain was somehow related to Jewel Tea, but I wasn’t sure of the details, so I looked it up. > > It appears that, up until the early 1980s, they were one and the same company, but at that point, Jewel decided to get out of the home delivery business. They spun the delivery part of the business off to its employees, and it became known as “J.T.'s General Store.” > > The Jewel grocery chain is still here in Chicago, though it’s gone through repeated ownership changes. I have no idea if the home delivery service company is still around. Thank you for anticipating my question. I saw this thread, read the first few posts and wondered if Jewel Tea was related to Jewel/Osco. I lived in the area for about three years. Here’s some history from the company website: [https://www.jewelosco.com/our-company/traditions-history/](https://www.jewelosco.com/our-company/traditions-history/) Growing up in a Seattle suburb in the seventies, we only had the milkman and the popsicle man. But now I occasionally see a beige Schwan’s truck. ---
**Author:** ![Ann\_Hedonia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ann_hedonia/32/319_2.png) [@Ann\_Hedonia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ann_Hedonia)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2019, 12:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jewel-tea/716496/25 "2019-02-26T00:28:06Z")
> [@Icarus](#): > > As a child of the 60’s in a small town in the mid-west I remember the Jewel Tea man visiting, and the Avon Lady with those bottles of after shave shaped like everything under the sun. My mother became an Avon Lady and was quite successful at it. She had cabinets full of all of the annual promotional awards for hitting sales and recruiting targets. She continued until she couldn’t handle it any more just a few years ago. I remember the Avon Lady. When I was a kid, sister and I loved it when she visited because she gave us lots of those white mini-lipstick samples. My mother collected some of their Nativity scene perfume bottles — after our home fire I had to value those for our insurance, and some of them were worth several hundred dollars. ---
**Author:** ![nelliebly](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nelliebly/32/5422_2.png) [@nelliebly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nelliebly)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2019, 6:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jewel-tea/716496/26 "2019-02-26T06:37:59Z")
I can’t believe nobody’s mentioned the [Fuller Brush man!](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuller_Brush_Company) ---
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2019, 9:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jewel-tea/716496/27 "2019-02-26T09:00:17Z")
actually on the trucks it was jewel-T …. but grandma bought actual tea in the green and blue boxes for decades and would buy things here and there for us …… you could buy a pudding you actually cooked over the stove in these huge containers and they used to sell my favorite cookie …. it was a lemon flavored sugar cookie ive never found anywhere else Some stuff like the housewares were over priced but ours would being over some neat toys……… when ours retired his son took over but grandma didn’t have anyone around and she quit drinking tea …… When I lived on my pwn years ago I used to buy ice cream from schwans but I thought some of their stuff was seriously expensive , ---
**Author:** ![pkbites](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pkbites/32/204_2.png) [@pkbites](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pkbites)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2019, 7:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jewel-tea/716496/28 "2019-02-28T07:35:50Z")
My Grandmother lived in a tiny little [village](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glenbeulah,_Wisconsin) and didn’t drive so the tiny little market and the Jewel Tea salesman were her source of a lot of stuff. One year for one of our birthdays (I forget whose) she gave us a Tonka style Jewel Tea [toy truck](http://tnttoytrucks.com/sitebuilder/images/FDBEV1107-450x330.jpg). ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2019, 3:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jewel-tea/716496/29 "2019-03-01T03:35:13Z")
How many of you got milk and stuff in the box on the porch? ---
**Author:** ![pkbites](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pkbites/32/204_2.png) [@pkbites](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pkbites)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2019, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jewel-tea/716496/30 "2019-03-01T17:13:34Z")
> [@eschereal](#): > > How many of you got milk and stuff in the box on the porch? My Grandmama did but we didn’t. We did have a “milk chute” built into the side of the house in case we did utilize a milk man. Only time we ever used it was when my Ma locked us out of the house and had to feed my brother through the chute so he could go inside and unlock the door. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2019, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jewel-tea/716496/31 "2019-03-01T17:17:41Z")
> [@eschereal](#): > > How many of you got milk and stuff in the box on the porch? We got milk deliveries in a milk box on the front porch when i was a little kid (probably up until 1970 or so). I don’t know if the delivery service went out of business at that point, or if my mom decided it was just cheaper to get milk when she went to the grocery store (which was only a couple of miles away). ---
**Author:** ![lost4life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c4cdca/32.png) [@lost4life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lost4life)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2019, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jewel-tea/716496/32 "2019-03-01T20:27:27Z")
> [@ThelmaLou](#): > > Yes, and the refillable potato chip can. 🙂 Charles Chips! A few years ago we walked into a bar/restaurant in Key West and I noticed a Charles Chips can sitting behind the bar. I strike up a conversation with what turned out to be the owner, and he tells me how he saw the can and it reminded him of his childhood, so he bought it to keep odds and ends in. I look at my kids and start to say “See, back in the day, they used to deliver…” My kids look at me and go “Dad…you had that same conversation with that guy last year.” Sooo, I ordered a margarita and called it a day. ---
**Author:** ![Alpha\_Twit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alpha_twit/32/265_2.png) [@Alpha\_Twit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alpha_Twit)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2019, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jewel-tea/716496/33 "2019-03-01T21:17:11Z")
> [@ThelmaLou](#): > > I also used [Schwann’s](http://www.schwans.com/) when we lived in the country. Excellent products. In that small town, people would leave their list in the kitchen, the back door unlocked, and he’d come in and put the stuff in their freezers. He always had a supply of dog biscuits, so the dogs loved it when his truck came up the driveway… I don’t know why I’m surprised by this, but…[DOGGIE SUNDAES.](https://www.schwans.com/products/product?id=53098&c1=9403&c2=23831) This is both wonderful and a sign of our eventual downfall. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jewel-tea/716496.md?page=1)