packaging as content

March 15, 2010

Paint & Toothpaste Tube Patents

It sounds like a “chicken-or-the-egg” type of question: “Which came first—the paint tube or the toothpaste tube?” This question, however, is one that we can actually answer: the paint tube came first.

The collapsible metal tube was, in fact, invented in 1841, by the American painter, John Goffe Rand. Some say his patented package (above) made Impressionism possible since it was suddenly feasible to paint outdoors.

So when did toothpaste get into the picture? Well… according to The Tube Council of North America, putting toothpaste into paint-style collapsible tubes was first thought of in 1892 by Dr. Washington Wentworth Sheffield, a dentist from Connecticut.

The patent below, however, seems to disprove that claim. Thomas A.D. Forster of Philadelphia—also a dentist—appears to have patented the idea in 1874—some eighteen years earlier! 

(A sampling of other tube-related packaging patents, after the fold…)

This 1883 paint tube includes a square loop handle for pulling the tube through a wringer in order to make fuller use of its contents.

This 1890 patent for a rigid paint tube seems like a precursor to the calking gun.  

A 1963 patent for a plastic collapsing tube proposing an internal “zip lock” (or else an internal locking zipper) to help squeeze out contents.

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

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