Blue Barrel Solutions

In the early days of oil production, oil was transported in barrels of different colors and sizes. Standard oil realized that it could significantly reduce the cost of transportation if it could manufacture its own barrels. Instead of buying oil barrels, Standard Oil bought tracts of oak timber, hauled the dried timber to Cleveland on its own wagons, and built the barrels in its own cooperage. Standard’s cost per wooden barrel dropped by 50%. Due to its reduced costs, Standard Oil’s blue barrels (painted blue for branding) and being lighter (as the timber was first dried before manufacturing the barrels) dominated the oil transportation business. They became the standard for oil transportation and also stood for quality and integrity. “ A standard oil blue barrel was always 42 gallons”. Our company endows the same qualities of ingenuity, integrity and setting the gold standard as did the blue barrel in the early days of oil transportation.