BP Touring Kits

Unlike, say Esso which sent out country maps from its touring service base in Paris, BP only provided one map - covering all of Europe at 1:4,000,000 with a relief map on the reverse. Country maps could only be obtained at BP stations in the countries themselves - hence the booklet of coupons (right) and list of Touring stations (below left). However as the Europe map is of such a small scale, it would fall to luck as to when the motorist came across a BP station after entering a country. As an additional incentive, though, BP stations in all countries except Italy would exchange the coupon for "a map of the country, other touring aids and a special gift souvenir".

The conversation guide was however better than those from competing companies, as not only did it cover 12 languages (including such rarities as Norwegian, Portuguese and Turkish) but included cutaway drawings of a car engine, chassis and body, providing almost a mini-Duden. Its main drawbacks were the omission of Spanish (as Spain still had a Government petrol monopoly) and a lack of phonetic pronunciations. This was actually the 1957 edition, so had been printed at a time when there were no BP stations in Italy; consequently motorists were advised to ask for AGIP fuels instead. The erratum card explained that you could now "buy your favourite BP brands - but because the BP shield is so new in Italy, you may not always be able to find our stations."

The insurance leaflet (centre of top photo) offered free personal accident cover of up to £1,000 for motorists (£250 for motorcyclists), with the option of purchasing additional cover, including worldwide baggage insurance. Underwritten by Blake & Marston, the free cover was valid to 1st April 1960.
The metric converter was a simple rotary device enabling conversion for tyre pressures, distances and fuel volumes.

In the late 1950s BP appeared to be running a touring service that was aimed specifically at visitors to France. The map and cardboard wallet shown here are undated, but likely to come from 1958 as they were found with the Paris map shown below. The map is unusually large when folded, and opens out to reveal France spread between the two sides, but with a large overlap (Paris appears on both the North and South sides). Principal BP stations are marked, and there is also a diagram showing the exit routes from Paris, and a second small map of France identifying main tourist sights.

The pack included a 1958 leaflet about Paris, printed in three languages and including two small scale maps by Blondel la Rougery, parking information, and lists of main sights and consulates.
A year or so later BP sponsored a booklet showing 8 tourist routes selected from 26 nationally designated. The attractions at towns along the routes were described in French, and a basic two-colour map provided for each named route.

Some of the items in the English Touring Service pack were multi-lingual, although the road signs transfer, insurance and metric converter were probably unique to the UK. A few BP Touring Service publications, including the touring guide, were published in several languages, including Danish and French, as shown in the photograph (right) and example (below left) from Denmark,which is dated 1959. BP kept the service for a number of years; the English guides in the back row are dated 1964 and 1966.

Some BP Touring Service items were printed with parallel texts in the three main languages: English, French and German. Probably dating from 1958, the Touring Service published a 48-page brochure called "Welcome to the Netherlands", with separate sections in each of the three languages, illustrated with attractive line drawings, but only a tiny planning map.

BP operated in most countries of Europe, and even remoter destinations such as Portugal were covered by the Touring Service. 10,000 copies of this 40 page booklet to Portugal in English, French and Portuguese were printed in 1959. Although it included no maps, but numerous humorous drawings by Fernando Bento. It was not a guidebook, but "Notes on the land, its people and peculiarities".

Although the Irish Republic was omitted from the main guide, a BP Touring Kit for Ireland has been found that contained a 1960 BP map of Ireland, a 1962 official Bord Failte Eireann guide to hotels and guest houses, plus eight small BP Touring Guide to Ireland booklets. All the 24-page booklets carried a cover price of 1/- (5p) and contained 10 suggested trips, each illustrated by a sketch map and six small two colour drawings. Between them the eight booklets covered the entire Irish Republic, although the were each named after a centrally placed town: Athlone, Bundoran, Cork, Dublin, Dundalk, Galway, Killarney and Wexford.

The BP map shown here was sent a BP customer in Canada, probably in 1959 or 1960. This particular customer wrote to a number of BP companies world-wide, so it probably came from their London Head Office, rather than via their newly established Canadian subsidiary.
The map itself is of the United Kingdom, dated 1958 and produced by George Philip & Son at the unusual scale, for British maps, of 1:850,000 (13.4 miles to the inch). The legend makes it clear that the map was specially prepared for BP Trading Ltd (a subsidiary of the main British Petroleum Company) and not the UK joint venture marketing company (Shell-Mex & BP Ltd). This means that it was not generally available for distribution within Britain, and no equivalent Shell map was produced. Philip's records indicate that 80,000 copies of this map were printed in October 1957; there was a companion "Welcome to Britain" booklet (with 50,000 copies printed) that does not appear to have been retained by the Canadian customer.