Sutherland Sisters Colorator Bottle

[JoelleA]

Hello all,

I'm new to the site and bottle collecting so let me know if I missed any needed information. I work at a thrift store and recently came across this bottle and began doing some research. This was the first time I had heard of the Sutherland Sisters and fell down a rabbit hole researching them. I have seen a lot online in regards to the Sutherland Sisters hair grower but very little pictures or information about the hair colorator, in fact I've only found 3-4 post from various websites about the colorator bottles. I've pieced together some general information regarding this bottle but I'm curious if anyone knows more as a lot of what I have is speculation and I could be very wrong.

On most, if not all of the Sutherland Sisters bottles they include the number "7" however, this bottle simply says "Sutherland Sisters Trade Colorator Mark" along with the name of one of the sisters (Dora Sutherland) on the sides of the bottle. At first I found this a little concerning wondering if it was a fake but I believe this bottle was made after 1912 and by that time two of the seven sisters had died and perhaps they changed their name due to this. Another curious thing is the name of only one of the sisters on the sides of the bottle, it's believed that they had a range of different colors for this product so maybe its possible that they used their names kind of as color names? but its also said that in 1908 Dora became the vice president of the company so maybe she took it upon herself to put her own name on the bottle? This of course is purely speculation on my part. I read somewhere that the sisters trademarked the word "colorator" in 1923 but stated they have been using the word since 1900, I don't have any confirmation of this however.

Let me know what you think or if you know anything more about the history of this bottle!

 

[CanadianBottles]

Welcome to the forum! It's a nice bottle, and not one I remember seeing before. Your bottle may have different embossing from the typical ones because it's Canadian, and the Sutherland Sisters never seemed to be able to sell their products that well in Canada because their bottles don't really show up here that often. Your bottle looks like it likely predates 1923 since it's mouth-blown and hand-tooled, it looks more like a 1910s bottle to me although I think they were still making bottles the old fashioned way in some limited capacity in Canada in the 1920s.

Speaking of thrift stores, I'm not sure if it's a universal experience but over the past year or so I've noticed a lot more good antique bottles showing up at thrift stores. I never used to find any when I went to thrift stores more often, but I found a beautiful cathedral pickle not long ago, and last week picked up what I think is a fairly uncommon 1910s Quebec City soda, and I only stop by a thrift store every month or two these days.

 

[JoelleA]

Welcome to the forum! It's a nice bottle, and not one I remember seeing before. Your bottle may have different embossing from the typical ones because it's Canadian, and the Sutherland Sisters never seemed to be able to sell their products that well in Canada because their bottles don't really show up here that often. Your bottle looks like it likely predates 1923 since it's mouth-blown and hand-tooled, it looks more like a 1910s bottle to me although I think they were still making bottles the old fashioned way in some limited capacity in Canada in the 1920s.

Speaking of thrift stores, I'm not sure if it's a universal experience but over the past year or so I've noticed a lot more good antique bottles showing up at thrift stores. I never used to find any when I went to thrift stores more often, but I found a beautiful cathedral pickle not long ago, and last week picked up what I think is a fairly uncommon 1910s Quebec City soda, and I only stop by a thrift store every month or two these days.

That's a great point! Thanks for commenting.

As for thrift stores, every so often we get some older bottles. This bottle came in with a few other antique bottles that are fairly common. Congrats on your thrift finds!

 

[Dogo]

Welcome to the Forum. Keep looking for info, the sisters did a lot of advertising. I don't know if much corporate information is available, but there should be plenty on their products. Sorry its not in my collecting area.

 

[Andy312]

Hi Joelle. I collect Sutherland Sisters items exclusively, and I can tell you that there is wide variation over the years in the bottles. They always used the trade name "7 Sutherland Sisters", up until the end, which was the early 1920s. After all, the first one died in 1893, so they just kept using the name. Sometimes the Colorator bottles don't have the "7", tho I don't know why. Also, I have never seen a Colorator bottle with any other sister's name on it, even though they was supposedly one color for each sister (plus an eighth color). Only Dora's name appears on any bottles. I have no idea why this is, though I continue to research it.