1926 Tierney Diner ad

[Dinerman]

I got a full page ad from the "world famous" Tierney Dining Car company. I typed up the copy, and thought someone here might like to see.

No matter what your present occupation, or where you are located- if you have been seeking YOUR opportunity; if you have been anxious to get into business for yourself- to be your own Boss- or if you are in business and dissatisfied with its results; if you want to make more money than you ever made in your life- if you are willing to work and win success- then a Tierney diner is YOUR opportunity. It's a clean, respectable PROFITABLE business for YOU- Every day in the year!

You would be one of the most independent men in your community. Your money would be turned over quickly. 30% - 40% of each days receipts would be your NET profit! You would have a strictly cash business. No bad accounts. No collections to make

The Dining Car business is spreading fast. Men like yourself, and with no more experience at the start, are getting rich in it. You can do it, too!

A Total capital of $3000 - will set you up in this business- provide the first payment on your car and leave enough to install it on location, open it up and start your daily receipts coming in- and many successful operators have done it on less.

YOU CAN START
The Dining Car Business in your own town.

The Tierney Real Estate Department checks up your location, or obtains one for you, thus assuring a proper business building location for your car.

We train you for success, just as we have trained hundreds of other operators of Tierney Diners.

You can take advantage of our Training School, if you desire.

Tierney service helps you in all details of operation, providing reliable and experienced chefs, and other employees, if desired, and supervises and guides your management, if needed, until you are sufficiently experienced to assure success by yourself.

no Tierney Dining Car located and operated in accordance with Tierney Service and Instruction need ever fail, for when you purchase a Tierney Diner you get back of you thirty years of successful experience in this business.

Tierney Service makes Monthly Payment Plan possible. The Lunch Car business is essentially a worker's business. It has not been built up by capitalists, although it has created capital for its operators- but has won out through the energy and close attention to business of men who with a small amount of money to start with have followed up that moderate capital with an unlimited supply of conscientious, faithful work. That is what makes the Lunch Car business such a sound, dependable business to be engaged in; it is built on foundations of individual industry and common honesty.

"Fully ninety-five per cent of the hundreds who have won success and independence in this business have started with very little money, so the plan had to be devised to help these men get there cars as well as stand by them until they had made a success of the business. In other words, after you have made your first payment down, the car will pay the balance."

Wherever you see a Tierney dining car you will find a man who is making money.

This portable restaurant is delivered on its own wheels to its permanent location, where connections are made for water, sewer, gas or electricity

Just the Way they look inside: Tiled floors and walls, stool porcelain, oak tops with nickel rim, counters marble or black walnut. Back of counter complete kitchen, tiled ice box, equipped with most modern type of range, short order stove; steam table, nickeled coffee urns, hot water heater. The last word in brightness and cleanliness.

If YOU owned a Tierney Dining Car like this, $5000 to $10000 should be your YEARLY PROFITS

 

[LEUII]

Where do I sign up?

I only wish it were that easy today.

 

[Dinerman]

Really sounds like they wanted the people who bought their diners to do well.

 

[tonyb]

To your knowledge, are any of those Tierney diners still around?

 

[Dinerman]

Very few of them left. Most have been remodeled beyond recognition. There's one that was restored recently, which a lounger visited. Check that out here.

 

[LocktownDog]

Now that could be a business I'd really get into. I'm sick of cooking for my boss.

Richard

 

[BJBAmerica]

Great post, interesting read....And the link to the remodeled diner that you provided....WOW, gotta try and stop by that place one of these days, no too too far from me here in Delaware.

Thanks!!!

 

[Dominic]

Originally posted by LEUII
Where do I sign up? I only wish it were that easy today.

I was just thinking the exact same thing!

 

[Dinerman]

Great post, interesting read....And the link to the remodeled diner that you provided....WOW, gotta try and stop by that place one of these days, no too too far from me here in Delaware.

Thanks!!!

Where in Delaware are you? Delaware has some nice places.

 

[dhermann1]

$3,000

I think that $3,000 at that time would be roughly equivalent to $50 or $60k today. A pretty serious investment. You could get a new car back then for $600 or less.

 

[dhermann1]

re: Red Rose Diner

That Red Rose Diner post is excellent! Wonderful pix of a near perfect restoration. This is a perfect example of one facet of "vintage" culture (I hate that terminology, would someone please come up with something better?) that I love. Vintage items, be they fountain pens, fedora hats, 1920's diners or old cars, are all items that can be used today in daily life just as if they were new contemporary objects. Items from earlier ages, Victorian, or earlier, may be admired. Furniture can be used, if you're careful, but other items, like clothes, etc., are not really practical for this day and age. Not so with vintage stuff. You can live a "vintage lifestyle" (there's that phrase again) to whatever degree you wish, and function perfectly well in the modern world.

EAT IN DINERS

 

[GwenLake]

You would be one of the most independent men in your community.

Men like yourself, and with no more experience at the start, are getting rich in it.

experienced chefs

but has won out through the energy and close attention to business of men who with a small amount of money to start with

Wherever you see a Tierney dining car you will find a man who is making money.

I take it not to many women owned or worked in diners in 1926.

 

[Dinerman]

Diners, at that time, were not deemed appropriate places for women to go to. Diners were originally late night lunch wagons set up around factories and docks and the like, and it took some time to shake that image.

A lot of early '30s diners have, enameled into the steel skin, phrases like, "Ladies Invited", "Table Service", "Booth Service" in an effort to attract women. They switched over from all stools to stools and booths, some places would put a baby carriage out front of the door as a sign to other women that it was a place that was clean, good, and safe enough to take your whole family.

So, no, there weren't many women owners or employees until a bit later.

 

[GwenLake]

Thanks for taking the time to explain it to me. It's quite appreciated, as I can't learn much about diners here where I live.

 

[Dinerman]

Here's one of the original turn of the century diners (horse drawn) and a slightly later diner (originally horse drawn, but converted to tractor driven, shown in 1958) It's still around and operational today, though it is now stationary.