Do you remember life before cupholders? Several decades ago, bringing a drink in a moving car was a risky endeavor – not so today. But before cupholders became a prosaic automotive feature, they went through an awkward stage. In the 1980s and ’90s many cars featured cupholders that were shallow, poorly placed or frailly constructed. Cupholders ultimately improved, and one particular advancement stands out: When an industrial engineer working for a beverage container manufacturer developed a prototype “Universal Cupholder.” His work served as a blueprint for many of the cupholders we take for granted in modern cars. Countless people’s clothing and car interiors were likely spared unsightly and frustrating spills thanks to this behind-the-scenes advancement. Let’s raise a cup and toast John Bridges, the most important man in the history of automotive cupholders.
First, a little background on drinking and driving (no, not that kind…) is helpful. Prior to the 1970s, drivers showed little demand for in-car beverage holders, as consuming food and beverages seemed best to do in places other than a moving vehicle. Gradually that began to change, and while many factors contributed to this attitude shift, two stand out: Commuting patterns, and fast food drive-throughs.
In 1960, about two-thirds of American workers drove to work; twenty years later that figure stood at 84%. Add increased workforce participation rates (i.e., women working) and generally longer commutes (due to both distance and thickening traffic), and we see how driving time gradually increased. Commuters became awfully tempted to grab a cup of coffee for the long drive into work.
Commuting wasn’t the only thing that prompted North Americans to drive more. Parents shuffling kids to activities, increased opportunities for family vacations, and many other factors in people’s busy schedules meant that the strict division between eating and driving blurred. And that brought about fast food drive-through windows, which gained considerable popularity during the 1970s.
At the dawn of the 1980s, consumers increasingly drank beverages in their cars, but drivers had to either put that drink between their legs, rest it on the passenger seat, or supply their own cupholder. Cupholders that fit into a car’s window frame slot became popular during this era, and were common fast food giveaways. The downsides of these were obvious – they tended to be wobbly, made of brittle plastic, fit only one size cup, and most importantly, using the car door when a drink’s attached to it could be… messy.
Spilled drinks from clip-on cupholders were problematic enough that aftermarket cupholders with custom-fit, spill-proof mugs became a common accessory. Many commuters likely received one of these as a gift in about 1982 or so.
Aftermarket console- and floor-mounted cupholders proliferated as well. Drivers sought better ways to contain beverages in their cars – though carmakers reacted slowly.
Interestingly, it appears that the first proper automotive cupholder appeared in the late 1970s – in an unlikely vehicle for ergonomic innovations. The 1977 Chevrolet Blazer and pickup offered an optional plastic center console with two molded cupholders (these replaced square holes that had been there for the previous several years). Given cupholders’ ubiquity in future years, one might expect Chevrolet to have trumpeted its new feature. But no; Blazer’s 1977 brochure didn’t mention cupholders at all, while the following year’s brochure simply noted the option package contained “a color-keyed console of molded plastic and fitted with beverage holders.”
Curiously, this particular cupholder console was an evolutionary dead end, as the cupholders were replaced again by square holes a few years later. Despite the growing popularity of in-car eating and drinking, no one seemed to notice this feature’s potential.
In the early 1980s, some conversion vans featured genuinely useful cupholders. The rest of the motoring public still made due to with aftermarket accessories.
If cars came equipped with cupholders at all, they were often shallow, round indents, such as on the back of the glove compartment door (a feature that had been around since the 1930s). Such “cupholders” were barely sufficient for holding drinks in a stationary car, let alone one in motion. But things changed quickly.
Chrysler’s groundbreaking minivans provide an interesting case study. When first introduced for 1984, the Plymouth Voyager and Dodge Caravan had virtually useless “cupholder” indents, placed prominently on the dashboard. The following year, Chrysler added an optional storage console, which included a slide-out cupholder tray. However, these inch-deep receptacles would be considered inadequate by today’s standards – too shallow, and only capable of holding cups of one specific size.
Amusingly, these first-generation minivans’ featured deep and securely mounted cupholders for third row passengers. But… the padded trim panel rendered them useless for all but short cups that were only partially filled (because they’d need to be tilted to get in and out). How hard can it be to make a cupholder? Surprisingly hard, as carmakers discovered.
Chrysler, and others, kept trying. Between the mid-1980s and the mid-’90s, cupholders became more common, but they still didn’t resemble the receptacles we see in modern vehicles. For one, carmakers strove to keep them hidden from view when not in use, and for another, they often only held one size of cup. The above pictures – from a Chrysler LeBaron GTS and a Lincoln Town Car – illustrate this well.
While better than clip-on-door cupholders, these designs proved problematic. Often awkwardly placed, they were prone to being knocked by elbows or knees, and their intricate plastic parts were subject to breaking.
This picture shows the cupholders in the 1995 Thunderbird that my wife bought new. The plastic cupholder mechanism latches into the center console lid, and swings into position when needed. However, the console can’t have much in it (or else the cups won’t fit), and the whole thing is right at elbow height. One day in 1996, my wife bought a cup of coffee, and brought it out to the car. Since the cupholder wasn’t deployed yet, she perched her coffee cup on the flat area near the gearshift and opened the console door. In doing so, she tipped the cup over, spilling its contents into the gearshift. Countless 1990s-era cars had carpet and other stains around the cupholders from just such a mishap.
Many automakers, particularly Europeans, resisted cupholders as a matter of principle, but Americans plowed ahead with increasingly numerous and creative beverage holding apparatus in their vehicles. Eventually, the Europeans gave in. BMW AG Chairman Bernd Pischetsrieder told North American reporters in 1996 that “All BMWs now have cupholders.” Then he tersely added: “I hate them.”
The priority given to cupholders could be measured in dollars. Ford reportedly spent $500,000 to design complex fold-out cupholders for the 1996 Taurus/Sable, and Chrysler spent an equivalent amount designing the front cupholders on its third-generation minivans. GM’s Design Chief summed it up in 1996 by stating “A long time ago there was a horsepower race. Now there’s a cupholder race.”
By the mid-1990s, cupholders had become valued by consumers, most new cars came equipped with them… and the dang things still couldn’t hold people’s cups. Not only was placement often suboptimal, but additionally most 1990s cupholders were still sized for only one type of drink container – and it rarely seemed to be the container a driver used.
The latter problem (cupholders fitting only one size cup) seemed to defy solution. After all, how could automakers design cupholders for countless sizes of beverage containers? Turns out the most meaningful thrust of cupholder innovation came not from the Big Three, but rather from Big Cup. To be specific, from the R&D chief of Aladdin Industries, one of the beverage container industry’s leaders.
Aladdin Industries is a company that most people have heard of, though in different contexts. Founded in 1908 as the Mantle Lamp Company of America, its founder, Victor S. Johnson, created an innovative kerosene mantle lamp, whose popularity soon surged. Johnson took to calling his signature product “The Aladdin Lamp” after the folktale character, and eventually the entire company became known as Aladdin Industries.
Aladdin soon expanded beyond lamps. In 1920, the company began selling “Thermalware.” Originally developed for WWI military uses, civilian Thermalware products were insulated sealable jars – glass on the inside, metal on the outside, with a layer of cork insulation between. In 1950, Aladdin expanded again by adding school lunch boxes to its portfolio, and the company became less known for lamps and more for food and beverage containers.
Throughout the 1980s, Aladdin was a major producer of insulated plastic mugs – popularized by coffeeshop and convenience store giveaways and coffee refill promotions. Since many of those mugs didn’t fit cars’ cupholders, customers complained… and eventually those complaints made their way to Aladdin. That’s when John Bridges, Aladdin Industries’ Vice President for Research and Development, became involved.
Bridges realized that Aladdin had “made close to 100 million mugs without much consideration about where people are going to set them.” His goals were ambitious: To arrive at some sort of benchmark for cupholder design, and get automakers and cup producers to agree on basic dimensional standards. Cupholders were, said Bridges, a product that would benefit from standardization. Citing examples of batteries, film, or electrical outlets, Bridges noted that without standards, there would be chaos.
Already a recipient of 100 patents for everything from insulated mugs to food trays, Bridges began investigating automotive cupholder designs in the early 1990s, and embarked on his Universal Cupholder project in 1993. His first task was to interview 35 automotive interior designers about how they settled on the cupholders used in their cars. Answers varied. Expecting responses based on analyses and measurements, Bridges was surprised by answers that were rudimentary, at best. One designer, for example, said he was instructed to design a cupholder to fit his boss’s favorite cup.
Clearly, car cupholders were an afterthought in the design process. Bridges’ solution seemed straightforward: Make an inexpensive, simple and useful receptacle for cups. That task wasn’t as easy as it seems. A main question was particularly vexing: For What Cup?
Researching the issue, Bridges discovered that 1990s drivers favored the following drink containers, in order of popularity: aluminum can, plastic bottle, paper cup (various sizes), insulated mug, ceramic mug, Styrofoam cup, followed by many others.
Bridges’ motivation in designing a “Universal Cupholder” was twofold – to persuade automakers to standardize their designs… and then to persuade the beverage industry to ditch oddly-shaped cups that gave drivers and industrial designers the most headaches.
Since cupholders are devices often taken for granted, it’s interesting to read the criteria that Bridges prioritized as he set about his task:
1) Ability to hold several sizes of cups.
2) Ability to hold cups stable with vehicular g-forces up to 1.1g.
3) Compact size: The cupholder and any attached mechanism must be small, since car cabin space is limited.
4) Simplicity: The cupholder must be simple and inexpensive to manufacture – avoiding typical 1990s cupholder designs made of fragile, complex moving parts.
To test how his designs performed under g-forces, Bridges and Aladdin used a g-force simulator (shown above).
Two years of research and development enabled Bridges to come up with his plastic-molded, tiered cupholder prototype. Wide at the top and narrower at the bottom, the “Universal Cupholder” worked by wedging cups in place, and also had a raised portion at its base to cradle the concave bottoms of aluminum cans. The upper portions could hold larger cups, such as paper fast-food cups.
A general tapered shape was important because it enabled drivers to quickly put a drink into the cupholder, while at the same time wedging the cup it into position so it wouldn’t tilt over during normal driving conditions. Wedging enabled friction to hold cups in place – simple, effective, and with no moving parts.
Aladdin Industries’ Universal Cupholder worked. While not every beverage container fit into its depths, it held more types of cups than most cupholders of its day, and was of a simple enough design to avoid fragile and fussy scaffolding. But inventions aren’t terribly useful if they just sit on a company’s R&D bench. Bridges needed to get the auto industry to adopt his cupholder idea.
Interestingly, Aladdin Industries did not intend to directly capitalize on this industrial design advancement. Bridges, in fact, said that “it makes sense to let everyone share the benefits” and hoped to assist both his own industry and carmakers standardize their products. One of Aladdin’s first steps was to provide the cupholder’s specifications to Whirley Industries, one of its closest competitors in the field of travel mugs.
Bridges shopped his concept to several manufacturers’ design studios, offering royalty-free agreements to enable those companies to use the Universal Cupholder, or its component ideas. Not all of them were receptive. Unsurprisingly, companies like Ford and Chrysler, which had recently spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on cupholder R&D were reluctant to take the advice of someone offering free design suggestions. Bridges’ best luck came with General Motors, where executive director of design Jerry Palmer was impressed enough to request his interior designers use Bridges’ concepts wherever possible in creating new interiors. (Aladdin had worked with GM a few years earlier on cupholder design too, and GM sized the console cupholders in 1992 Suburbans and Blazers to fit Aladdin insulated mugs.) In addition to GM, Aladdin signed a similar agreement with Mercedes-Benz.
It’s unclear whether these or other companies used Bridges’ exact design, but in the years that followed, cupholders made huge strides. Many of these advancements directly resulted from the Universal Cupholder, and manufacturers undoubtedly experimented with Bridges’ ideas. For example, one company that tested out Bridges’ design was Navistar International, whose engineers noted that large bumps were still able to dislodge drinks from this new cupholder. Navistar, therefore, recommended deeper cupholders. Surely countless accounts like this occurred in the late 1990s as companies evaluated their own universal cupholder specifications.
While Bridges’ end result didn’t become a global standard, it was the first major attempt to improve car cupholders, and quickly led to industry-wide adoption of better design ideas. In several respects, this was the progenitor of many cupholder designs used in today’s cars.
Take a look in modern cars, and there’s a good chance that the cupholders share some characteristics from John Bridges’ design, like tiered sides, dimpled bottoms, and a general reliance on wedging cups into place. In fact, most modern cars have multiple, simple cupholders that can accommodate a wide variety of cup sizes.
While not all cupholders directly trace their lineage to this Aladdin Industries’ project, the concepts given to interior designers by that exercise quickly led to an improved product. This endeavor showed the ease with which designers could merge useful cupholders into modern car interiors, as well as the benefits of interaction between consumer product companies (in this case the beverage container industry) and automobile manufacturers. Overall, the world of cupholders is infinitely more functional than it was when John Bridges began examining more effective designs.
So, next time you’re driving, and place your soda bottle in a nice, secure cupholder… take a moment to thank John Bridges and Aladdin Industries. Their promotion of a simple, yet effective cupholder design prompted general improvement of an automotive amenity that most drivers now take for granted. We should all drink to that.
Thanks for this article – I have thought about cupholder design and it’s slow ascendance to usefulness/ubiquity numerous times over the 70+ cars that have passed through my ownership. It seems that ashtrays and cigarette lighters recieved priority beforehand – individual ashtray/lighter combos for each passenger were what many cars prioritized.
I prefer the hidden designs but agree that they are never deep enough to be useful past a specific size and/or too fragile and subject to damage in practice. The earliest of the Japanese versions were deployed right before and after 1990 – usually a small pull out under the radio with two openings with useful depth of about an inch which would endanger your radio. The original Subaru Impreza actually had this tray ABOVE the radio.
I don’t like the exposed openings in consoles today – the Lexus LS400 had my favorite design; a wonderfully damped mechanism that with a gentle press would pop out over the burlwood console and retracted in the same manner. Sadly they were useless and about an inch shallow as well but it was such a well-engineered piece besides and was invisible when not in use.
It’s amazing how much priority auto ashtrays received, I assume because a lot of the designers and engineers smoked. I’ve never smoked, but I assume the interior designers of the third-gen Prelude I used to own did, because the front ashtray was very carefully positioned so that you could rest the heel of your hand on the top of the shift lever and tap out your cigarette ash without having to look down (and was centrally located so this was true with both LHD and RHD cars). That’s more ergonomic attention than some cars and trucks got throughout their entire cabins.
My current car has a pretty decent cupholder setup in the center console, which takes the very sensible idea that if you want to conceal the cupholder, it’s better to have the LID move while the holder stays stationary. (There are two cupholders under a flip-up lid between the shift lever and the handbrake.) In contrast to the LS400, the cupholders are a little too deep to be convenient for 12-ounce cans, but they work pretty well for most fast food and convenience store cups, and they’re fine for soda bottles.
The mystery of ash tray design/placement was, to me, that period in the 60s when they had to coexist with a/c vents that were starting to become common. I remember reading period reviews of ashtrays right below center a/c vents which made it easy to get ashes blown off the end of the cigarette before it made it to the ash tray. So kind of the opposite of the nicely-conceived setup in your Honda.
A roommate had a ’65 Olds 442 F85 with a dash swivel ashtray, and I, a non smoker, was quite impressed with its efficacy. One tap with any finger, and it swung around open for use. One more tap, and it disappeared.
On the Prelude, the A/C vents were higher up on the center stack — they were above the climate control dials and the radio, the ashtray below, so I imagine it would have been fairly easy to keep the ash from being blown around by the vent output unless you made a point of waving your cigarette in front of the vents with the fan on full blast. Not being a smoker, I never tried, mind, but someone at Honda had pretty clearly given it a lot of thought.
Good point about the ashtrays. From a modern perspective, it’s always amusing to see an older car with multiple ashtrays (or for that matter, multiple ashtrays for the rear seat passengers). Definitely a priority for previous generations.
I had included a reference to the Lexus cupholders in an earlier draft of this article, but took it out for brevity’s sake. That LS400 sliding cupholder was a marvel in the cupholder world at the time. Like all things in the LS400, it was overengineered – evidently, the plastic pieces were interspersed with rubber to avoid cheap-feeling plastic-on-plastic contact. But though I read several complimentary references to these cupholders in period reviews, none mentioned that they were too shallow… showing that folks’ expectations for the actual utility of cupholders was still rather low in 1990.
Haha – interesting that you thought of them as well! I used to place Big Gulp cups in mine and hitting the brakes would topple them right over… you can see the armrest that sort of overhangs in the airspace above the openings.
The mechanism is really beautifully engineered. i posted a 1995-2000 version above but the original 1990-94 had a lid that flipped down concealing the cupholder; but that lid had little rubber nubs on the corners – so that it wouldnt make noise on or scratch the burlwood! There were also felt pads strategically placed to avoid any plasticky noises like you mentioned. And in another tie-in, if I recall the mechanisms for the cupholder, front ashtray and glovebox were all engineered to open at either the same speed or timespan (I forget which at the moment.)
For anyone unfamiliar, here is a short video demonstrating what we’re talking about:
Just a moment to comment on what was a fantastic cup holder accessory – Saturn’s removable cup holder liner – dish washer safe. You just popped it out, dropped it into the dishwasher, and viola’ – spotless, sanitary cup holder – always clean. Thank you GM.
What an awesome article thoroughly covering all experiments & developments! Thanks! Growing up through this era I got to witness this all firsthand.
Ah yes, ashtrays. My thought as well reading, it’d be interesting to do an article about the decline (and rise if it could be traced back far enough) of ashtrays (& lighters, allowing 12V accessories). I suspect decline is because the space is more demanded for USB & electronics nowadays as the population of smokers has declined. I mean at one point every rear seat passenger even in small econo cars had to have their own. Perhaps it’s come full circle now where an ashtray is an optional cup shaped thing that the manufacturers can sell you out of the dealership parts counter.
I’m sure the last great ashtray I recall seeing was my 2007 F150 with center console. Hinged & damped befitting a Lincoln, it came out from the dash at a 45. The kind of space that nowadays is used for electronics. But I guess coming out in 2004 the truck’s design would’ve been fixed years earlier, a time when many still smoked. But then Ford always seemed to go overboard with ashtrays & lighters. An Acura I had used a pull out tray with a plastic liner labeled ‘not an ashtray’. Uh that’s clearly what this little drawer was designed as, about useless for anything else.
In addition to peak ashtray (the panel seen ahead of the shifter), that truck also managed about peak cup holder. Standard sized holders made of easy to remove rubber inserts that could be thrown in the dishwasher. With the inserts removed of course the space remaining could hold the biggest cup or bottle you’d likely find.
We drive a Toyota Auris hybrid with fold-out cupholders, they work well, for European sized drinks. No big gulp would ever fit in there, but those, we don’t have here anyway.
Our other car, a 2014 Tesla Model S, has 2 cupholders in the center console, and nothing more. Good enough for us, but again, no big gulp will ever fit in there.
Crazy interesting article btw!
I agree that 2 cupholders in the front is good enough for me. On the other end of the cupholder spectrum, our Odyssey minivan has 15 cupholders. Even on long trips with a family, we don’t need quite that many of them!
There’s a classic scene in Better Call Saul when Saul moves up to a corporate gig that pays well but not much else, and he gets to replace his decrepit old Suzuki Esteem for a new Mercedes sedan.
Well, he tries to fit his omnipresent coffee mug into the Benz and it won’t fit, no matter how he tries to jam it in. Eventually, he gives up the corporate gig and goes back to his Esteem, with a definite look of happiness when he’s able to put his coffee mug back into the appropriately-sized Suzuki cupholder.
I tried one of those aftermarket plastic sits on the tunnel cupholder/catchall trays on my 66 Bel Air as a kid. Not real effective. I really don’t care about cupholders 40 years later, hard to beat a giant sweating ice tea between your legs on a hot summer day. Poor man’s AC.
I thought I was the only one who did this.
This was a great topic! A school roomie was enthralled with those holders that hung on the door of his 77 Impala, but I always hated loose/extraneous things inside my cars. My mother liked those little plastic wastebaskets with the two beanbag-fllled ears that kept it on the transmission hump ahead of the seats, but I never used those for the same reason.
Those indents in the glove box were around my whole life and were designed, I believe, for use at a drive-in restaurant. When we went to those in my childhood, the one sitting in front of the glovebox had a prime seat because that was the only place to sit a drink.
Some 90s designs may not have been great for actually holding cups, but they were so cool to watch in operation that I never minded. A friend had a mid 90s Saab that had a single cup holder that slid out of a little slit in the dash and unfolded itself into a spindly plastic holder. Not very effective, but always fun to watch. 🙂
Thanks! And I’m with you on avoiding extraneous things inside my cars. Yuck.
Those ’90s “magically deploying” cupholders were neat, but once the gee-whiz factor wore off, they were inevitably a pain.
In high school, I had periodic visits to the orthodontist. The 25 mile drive back to school always involved eating lunch on the way back while driving my parent’s 1984 Ford F-150. The cupholder? My crotch. Shifting gears with a drink between one’s legs is possible but does require thought.
My 1996 Thunderbird had cupholders identical to those in Mrs. Eric703’s Thunderbird. I knew the world had progressed in a truly meaningful way – which isn’t always the case.
No doubt there is a stereotype about Americans and large volume drinks. I’m not sure why wishing to remain hydrated is such a bad thing. But I do know that Volkswagen of mine has the best cupholders of any car I’ve owned. They will effortlessly accommodate my big gulp sized stainless steel water canteen that can easily be removed for placement of a 12 ounce aluminum can.
Eric, this was a great article.
My pre-cupholder solution for bringing drinks into the car was to stick the bottle between the drivers seat and the door. Worked relatively well, except that about 75% of the time I’d forget it was there and open the door before removing the bottle, causing the bottle to fall out, and inevitably, roll underneath the car.
Cupholder evolution does, in fact, appear to be an example of meaningful progress.
I’m not so sure. I mean, the proliferation of liquid refreshment drive-thrus certainly seems like a blight on the land. And, really, does anyone think a 64oz coffee or slurpee is good for anyone other than Starbucks or 7-Eleven’s bottom line?
But, TBH, I do like the built-in cupholders if, for nothing else, they offer convenient places to keep small, loose items in a vehicle. In that regard, they seem like the modern version of the car ashtray.
Hell, there still might be a few manufacturers who offer a ‘smoker’s package’ that provides a right-sized, lidded ashtray that fits into a cupholder and (maybe) a cigarette lighter.
I’m not sure why wishing to remain hydrated is such a bad thing.
Not really wanting to hijack this thread, but it is important to know that the whole “drink 8 glasses of water/fluid per day” is scientific hogwash and was 100% the fabrication of a madly successful PR campaign by the bottled water industry. The result is that many people now drink water/other drinks almost incessantly.
Meanwhile, the scientific reality is that humans can derive 100% of their true required fluid intake from their food! Seriously. Most food, especially the kind we should eat more of (vegetables and fruit) is largely water. Yes, if a person is very active, or in a hot climate, additional fluid intake is of course called for.
But the change from when I was young to today is utterly startling. Back then we drank something when we actually felt thirsty. The whole concept of “hydrating” had not yet been invented by the bottled water industry. And if one got a Coke with lunch, it was a 10 or 12 oz, although the little 6.5 ounce bottles were still quite common then too. And a cup of coffee was…an 8 oz.cup. Of course all this was before the obesity crisis, largely fueled by cheap corn syrup sweetened drinks.
I’ll get off my soap box now. But cup holders are almost totally wasted on me, except when I’m on a long trip in the van and eat lunch on the go.
But no, wishing to stay hydrated isn’t a bad thing; it’s a really great thing for the bottled water and beverage industry! 🙂
I have seen lots of young people (and are related to a few) who carry metal water containers almost everywhere they go. At least I presume they are water.
Here in the midwest, the phenomenon I notice is the seeming need of half the population to carry around a gigantic soft drink cup everywhere they go. People coming to court/jury duty, people going to the doctor, people shopping – everyone needs a Big Gulp, apparently. I have never understood the concept of guzzling down 60 ounces of diet soda. Actually, I don’t understand the concept of diet soda at all. If you are trying to lose weight, just don’t drink the stuff. Yes, I know my opinion is in the minority, especially in my part of the country.
I was being somewhat facetious when saying that.
If dogs and cats can stay hydrated by food only it stands to reason people could also. A while back I watched a clip from the English show “Mrs. Brown’s Boys” and there was a riff about carrying around water bottles vs drinking from a glass.
That said, I have fallen into the habit of often having a drink nearby due to removal of a salivary gland and the resultant dry mouth. I’m still not at 64 ounces daily (or whatever the recommendation was).
I have seen patients come into my exam room and place their water container on the desk. Some of these containers are 32 oz. size. During the exam they are always taking sips from their container as though they were dying of thirst in less than an hour. I usually ask how much they drink and it will either be the one or two of them. Gently prodding them I say that is nice but have you ever researched how much water you really need overall. No, is the answer and so I suggest they do so as they will be surprised and leave it at that. Some, two years later, come in for their next routine exam but this time no water bottle and I just smile to myself.
Funny, in a kind of cc effect me and a freiend talked just yesterday about the cupholder topic as we were searching them in his new to him used VW Golf wagon.
For all its engineering excellence and constant performance improvement, Porsche (in its cars, at least) provides the world’s worst cup holders. They’re so awful and rinky-dink I think their awfulness must be intentional (in the spirit of the BMW executive quoted in the article).
I remember the Chrysler 300C I had a few years back actually had heated and cooled cupholders. I haven’t seen that option in anything since and it appears to have been rare even in that car although in-car fridges were not uncommon in some minivans and larger SUVs for a time, perfect for the road-trip.
I think the Europeans (at least their car-manufacturing nations) generally held the view that drinking or eating while driving is somewhat ill-advised, hence their at least initial reluctance to come up with good solutions to facilitate that while the car is in motion. It certainly can be distracting, not everyone can limit themselves to sipping from a cup with a straw, instead tilting their head all the way back to get the last remnants out of the 24oz Arizona can, or taking the lid off a SuperTanker to chew on the ice, or perhaps adding more taco sauce to a taco while in motion…Give ’em an inch, they’ll take a mile!
Another great start of a thread: There is food suitable for the road, and food that is not suitable for the road. A burger (as long as it is fairly thin and dry) is good. A taco is definitely not good.
The best part of my year with a new 1982 Chevy Citation was the huge cupholder molded into the front seat. It was a revelation. Large enough for any sized disposable drink cup, it enhanced my life far more than any other part of that X Car.
I used the vehicles to spend days driving throughout the Rocky Mountains, so I always had jerky and liquid by the driver’s seat. The 1981 Futura didn’t have anything, and I never had anything in a car before the Citation.
As you can imagine, after a year and getting rid of that car, from then on, I had to have something.
Ah! I knew there would be another early cupholder that I overlooked. This seems similar to those late-70s Blazers – and somewhat amusingly, the Citation’s optional console with floor-shifter didn’t offer cupholders.
The front cupholder and console on 1981-85 X bodies with bench seats was the result of a new US government mandate that cars without center seat belts couldn’t have a seating position there. Several Ford Fox platform cars had similar trays, though usually split in half on 50/50 bench seats. The same law held for rear seats, thus the center console trays on early 1982 J bodies (Cavalier, etc) built in spring or summer of 1981, complete with decent cup holders (on sedans and notchback coupes only; hatchbacks and wagons didn’t get cup holders because they were afraid people would forget the drinks were there when folding the rear seatbacks down and spill the drinks). Some cars, like the 1981 T-bird, just had a permanent armrest in the center rear to prevent it being used as a seat, no console.
The center consoles in bench seats were unpopular, so center seatbelts were quickly added so the center seat cushions could be restored.
The Citation’s console on bucket-seat cars (a different design from those later used on bench seats) goes back to 1980 (actually mid-1979), when they were still allowed to have an unofficial front center seating position without a seatbelt, so the bucket-seat console predated the 1981 cupholders in bench seats. Also for some reason, 1980 X bodies with buckets, center consoles, and automatic transmissions got column shifters; only starting in 1981 did cars with all three options get floor shifters. Neither the bucket-seat consoles with or without a shifter had cupholders, unlike the later bench-seat center tray.
Thanks for this background – the various seat designs make more sense to me now.
I couldn’t find a clear pic of the early-1982 J-body rear seat except this one from the Cimarron brochure. Although it’s hard to see, I think the cup holders are in the front of the tray. It’s possible the Cimarron used a different tray than the Cavalier and J2000 since only the Cimarron had a fold-down center armrest that had to not interfere with drinks in the tray. I recall my J2000 having round cupholders set somewhat diagonally, but maybe my recall is off. (the Olds and Buick J-cars arrived in late ’82 after GM went to full-width rear seats with three sets of seatbelts).
Throughout my childhood and youth, apparently no one had the concept of “hydration”.
These days, I wouldn’t consider leaving the house without a bottle of water.
See my comment further up. The bottled water industry’s PR campaign has been effective with you and they thank you! Why rely on the sensation of thirst?
I just saw your comment and don’t disagree in principle, there’s probably a good reason why OSHA requires an employer to provide potable drinking water on a jobsite, and I’m not sure it has anything to do with PR from the bottled water industry.
When I’m working outdoors in 110F/43C and 10% humidity, I don’t “feel thirsty” until it’s way too late. The desert is a strange place.
As I said in my longer comment above, there are of course situations where substantial amounts of water are necessary/appropriate. Working outside or in hot locations is an obvious one, as is just being in the desert. I wasn’t referring to that. Water was provided on job sites going back a very long time. And we had drinking fountains in school.
I was simply pointing out that the concept of forcibly drinking in excess of what one’s thirst indicates is a totally modern concept, and not one strictly based on science.
FWIW, too much fluid is more dangerous than not enough, as it can dilute essential electrolytes, with dire consequences.
It’s funny how things like “hydration” change between generations. My kids take huge water bottles to school every day – I believe they were required to do so in elementary school (in order to stay hydrated, of course) and now that they’re older most kids apparently take water bottles to school, and drink and eat in class.
I told one of my daughters that when I was in school we weren’t allowed to have drinks in class, let alone food, and she looked at me like I couldn’t possibly be serious.
So school has become like “Fast Times at Ridgemont High” wherein you can order a pizza in history class… Amazing… 🤣
Great article, BTW, and yes, I remember when they finally started to get cupholders right with my own MN12, a ’97 T-Brid. (well, the ex had a ’94).
My ’83 Aerobird had a tray in front of the shifter that worked in a pinch, but it wasn’t very good. I found a ceramic coffee much with a low center of gravity that fit well in there.
I don’t recall what the ’88 T-Birds had going on (if anything). I think my V8 may’ve had a similar setup to the ’83, but where that tray would be in the Turbo Coupe was a 5-speed shifter boot, so no cup holder there… Come to think of it, even thought the LX was an automatic, its shifter was in the same place, so it probably didn’t have cupholders either.
My favorite cupholders were the ones in my 97 & 99 Suburban – the front dash one for the driver held Sheetz/Wawa soda cups perfectly, and the passenger one was great for soda cans. And if you had the center console, there were two pull out ones for the rear passengers as well as the two in the rear armrest. Least favorite are the ones in the early to mid 90’s GM FWD sedans…the spring loaded arm breaks and flops around letting the cup tip over easily.
My parents Escalade (a 2012) has heated and cooled front cupholders. I don’t think they’ve ever used them, but nice to know they are there.
An interesting and very exciting story about an element in the interior of a car that is totally foreign territory for me.
Foreign territory in so far as I have never used a cupholder in my long automotive life. Likewise, although I am a smoker, I have never used an ashtray in an automobile.
Both for drinking (as well as eating) and smoking I have always been very privileged (or disciplined) in my life to be able to take the time to do it outside a car. Sounds very snobbish and it probably is.
Nevertheless, it is interesting to read about such things and to learn about the social relevance – after all, there are other people, with different needs, than me.
Thank you for these article.
Thanks! It seems that cupholders are sort of a “window seat vs. aisle seat” type of issue.
I rarely use cupholders in daily driving, though I do on long trips. My wife, on the other hand, brings water and/or coffee with her everywhere, so our cupholders get plenty of use.
“window seat vs. aisle seat” brings to mind the ashtray thing mentioned early here in the comments…and that is I think that it was only recently that I noticed that I seldom encounter an airplane that doesn’t still have ashtrays in the armrests. Mostly the lids are/were glued down…I suppose to prevent people from filling the ashtrays with gum and other trash, now that the devices can no longer be used for their intended purpose.
But, I recall maybe about a dozen years ago flying somewhere with my kids and their investigation of every bit of their seat environment…and asking me what those little doors were for on the armrests. I responded that those were ashtrays…something that blew their 10/12 year old minds. “You mean people used to SMOKE on airplanes???!!!!” 🙂
Indeed… Why DOES Boeing waste the money on installing these. You can’t smoke on airplanes (nor should you), so why are ashtrays still installed?
The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration prescribes required equipment for aircraft, and ashtrays are on the list because if someone decides to inflict their nicotine addiction on everybody else and lights a cigarette, there needs to be a safe place to put it out without causing a fire.
Other countries’ requirements are likely similar.
This was a great read–and very informative, even if I lived through the whole era.
JPC sure seems right about the “indents” being for a stationery vehicle at a drive-in; I wonder now when those disappeared. In my own world, our 1990 Ford didn’t have them (that I remember), but the 1996 Contour had one of those hidden, flip-up-and-out things in the console, which seemed pretty snazzy.
Some eBay poking turned up this forgotten item, marketed as early as 1980–the “Kool Rest” could keep a six-pack on ice, and had two can-holders as well; pretty neat! https://www.ebay.com/itm/175632764499?hash=item28e4874e53:g:4ZAAAOSwwudj~kjF&amdata=enc%3AAQAHAAAA4FdhDYAYq4Sq1mJL%2B2k5uJEH6XD6QOzE961%2B4pK1NHMmixzh9coPZnafreiB6ZtVHS6OLsZR21MkKy1VEsnM%2Fg1ROqDmJQTxBY3GQINiI4bAOCUJovHiGjWJG%2BMhRmtmud3e%2BlKvzyLwH1spPhGnLcLfqkHEcwweK8ZsB%2BcsqC3%2Fq755BwPUtgWVL6pRA5VNUzfMZuRwURJntdpG8p%2F1gYepBJtW7bu%2Figr%2B2Fo1q87Jfo%2FqP07LlaF71duUPVDyVIS2ZvC6UvbbiSTz3tHxd7sg%2FC7GHyTP5Gd3GX6%2BCmqZ%7Ctkp%3ABk9SR9a3nvzWYQ
I love that Kool Rest — and look at the price – $85.00! If only we’d have known, we could have bought a few dozen of those back in 1982. I think there may have been a custom-fitted ice pack that would screw onto the bottom of the red lid (that might be what the hole in the inside of the lid is for). Goodness, one of those with the ice pack would probably sell for twice that.
I had a ’98 Contour, and it didn’t have flip-up-and-out cupholders, but rather two cupholders just forward of the gearshift. When I bought that car used (in 2000), there were stains running down each side of the console, likely from spilled coffee. Turns out those cupholders were practically useless, and I guess the previous owner found out the hard way.
And that Kool Rest clearly hails from a time when carrying a cold six pack on the hump between the seats, with holders for the beverages being consumed, was A-OK.
Although I will say that my first thought when looking at those eBay pics was “why is there a space for putting a telephone handset in the top of that cooler?”
Speaking of six-packs, one of the interesting tidbits in the annals of cupholder history is that when cupholders were becoming more common, some people worried that having a place to store drinks would encourage drunk driving.
One 1989 article I read actually posed this question to the executive director of Mothers Against Drunk Driving, but he not doubted there’d be a correlation between cupholders and DUIs, he further added that he wished his own car had a cupholder. I saw no references to DUIs/Cupholders after that.
Great topic, post, and comments!
I started out my driving days with that plastic-hang-from-the-door kind of cup holder. I seem to recall being given one once for an Xmas present (I come from a place of low extravagance). In the ’72 LeSabre, they were a pain and prone to breaking, but really the only time I would use something like that was on a very long highway trip. The idea that I would need to stow beverages on a daily driving basis was absurd at the time in the early 1980s. Well, ok, the trunk held beer kegs quite well, but that’s a whole different beverage kind of thing.
Since then, I’ve seen the ever-evolving cup holder in subsequent cars just as outlined here. I rented a Kia Sportage this past week and there were enough cup holders in that thing for each occupant to have 2 or 3 for their own use. There were 4 in the between the front seats console. Amazing. I don’t think there was an ashtray though. So I’m not sure what a smoker (there still are some of those folks…) would do.
I favor the hidden ones if I have to have one. My daily driver BMW is a 2008, and even then BMW was apparently showing Pischetsrieder’s attitude from 20 years earlier in that there are only 4 cup holders – one and ONLY one for each potential occupant, thank you very much – and they all retract so as to be entirely invisible. Invisible, although not inaudible. 15 years old, and the ones that disappear into the dash are rattling like crazy as their highly engineered mechanisms start to get loose. So I’ve stuffed the things with foam…which makes their ability to glide out of the dash when activated somewhat iffy. That’s fine with me. I think I still have one of those door hanging things if I really need a cupholder.
If you have a long commute you appreciate cupholders more than most drivers. In the Bay Area I had many co workers that had an hour, to an hour and 15 minute commute under the best conditions. This commute could easily stretch out to two hours if something caused the traffic to get bogged down or stopped. Besides cups, the cup holders are great for change, candy, gum wrappers, cell phones, chargers, pens and what have you. I agree that the big holes in the console are effective,but I don’t like looking at them, especially as they get dirty and filled with crumbs and other droppings. I am diligent about keeping them clean and any spills wiped up.
For an older car I’ve found that these slide in cup holders are an inexpensive and handy solution.
I tend to favor the exposed cupholders just on the basis of simplicity, but yes, they’re constantly collecting dirt and junk. In a car with lots of exposed cupholders, it because rather annoying.
Great article, and so interesting! Ask any auto OEM’s marketing department, and they will tell you that cupholders nowadays are one of the primary criteria people look at when buying a car. A bad cupholder design can be a dealbreaker. And when I worked for GM back in the 1990’s and 2000’s, I was witness to many heated debates about cupholder sizing, placement, etc in the console. And the required addition of cupholders in the console is the primary reason that the parking brake on many cars, previously a pull-up lever next to the driver seat, has been banished to a foot pedal underneath the dash, or a little button for an electric parking brake.
Having said that, the best cupholder I’ve ever had on a car was not a cupholder. My 1990 Chevy Beretta didn’t have a cupholder, but I could wedge any size beverage between the parking brake lever and the driver’s seat cushion and it would hold the drink securely through any kind of driving.
My 1992 Beretta had near-worthless cupholders that slid out of the dash, and a not much better square cutout in the console. I’d wager your approach to just wedging the drink somewhere was more effective.
This was the same approach I used with an 89 mustang. Of course nowadays you can actually buy replacement consoles for those cars which replace the ashtray with cup holders.
Flipping the script to talk about cup design for a bit, my wife and I both have an insulated stainless tumbler called a YETI. We have the 30oz size that we use to stay hydrated.
The YETI, although large in size, is well designed to fit it today’s “standard” cupholders. It’s smaller in diameter at the bottom, and flares out, so that it fits snugly into all three of my cars’ cupholders. So perhaps, Mr. Bridges’ vision finally came to fruition.
Normally, on my commute, I use a 20oz Copco plastic travel mug for my morning coffee. Again, with long commutes, these things are a must, and as your article points out, cupholders seem to be more of an American phenomenon, thus BMW’s attitude towards them.
I recently purchased a new-to-us 2019 Mazda CX-5 for my wife to use. When we test drove the vehicle on a Saturday morning, I brought the aforementioned coffee mug with me, and since she never travels anywhere without her YETI, that was brought along too. When we got back to the dealer we joked with the salesman that the car passed the “Cupholder Test”.
For me though, my 2016 Civic has the best design of all the cars in our fleet. Be it the YETI, the Copco, or just about any beverage purchased out, they all fit just right in that car.
And my Mustang? In 2007, the cupholders were very good for the times (still are), however I like to rest my hand on the shifter. When the cupholder is in use, this is not ideal (especially with the aforementioned YETI), as Ford, who is normally VERY good at ergonomics, messed up on this one… the two beverage holes are right behind the shifter. But Ford is known for improving things, especially with ergonomics, and subsequent Mustangs now have a longitudinal offset, so this is no longer an issue.
Great Topic Eric! A Cc that kinda turned into a QOTD, making for great comments, too!
Darn, cant find any pictures of it, but the front seat adjustment handles of Mercedes W115/W116/W123 were perfect for holding a bottle or a tall cup pressed between it and the seat. Consciously or unconsciously, i dont know
I think my first vehicle with factory cupholders was a1993 Ford Ranger with XLT trim and a mini console. That design worked well and had a sliding piece to adapt to different containers. Before that I made do with one of those plastic things hung from a window and never bothered with a cupholder on a motorcycle. (don’t laugh I used to see Gold Wings with gimbaled cupholders made for boats).
Subsequently our standard for cupholders is whether a standard bicycle water bottle fits. Peak cupholder was our Mazda5 with 2 good sized ones in the front console, flanked by bottle pockets in the doors, a pair in the fold out piece between the second row and a pair in the way back we used for holding spares or empties since they were easily reached from the rear hatch.
An interesting commentary on drink container trends is the foam pucks supplied with our Mazda CX-5. These are “booster seats” to raise 12 ounce paper cups above the edge of the cupholder for easy grasping. 16 ounce and up don’t need these.
Now “the tables have turned” Optional “ash receptacles” are usually cup holder conversion kits.
Big Cup helped it along too. Not sure who started it, but in the mid 90s, Taco Bell advertised the cruiser cup which was stepped down smaller at the bottom to fit in a cupholder better. Eventually cups of all types started being made in this form.
I’m much more concerned with car cupholders than the Android Auto and Apple Car Play that seems to make up ninety percent of car review content these days!
When I first started getting into cars as a teenager, cupholders was one of the things that I paid most attention to. Seriously.
Many years later – whether it’s bringing a travel mug of coffee to the office, or needing some refreshments on a long road trip – practicality matters.
Two of my vehicles I had to resort to using the storage bin under the center armrest. Keep it plopped open and use that space. Including a 1996 model that had none. Actually, it may have had those indentions on the opened glove box door, but those don’t count.
The talk about the McDonald’s hot coffee lawsuit promoting cupholders in cars – internet misinformation, or at least partially true?
If I may take some literal freedom
“Build a better cup holder…”
…and the ones depicted just after this correct statement are directly above a bunch of switches for windows and stuff. Just the bestest place ever in the whole wide world for the inevitable spill, eh!
Cupholders are important to me, having to do hour+ drives for commuting. The early Mark IV Jetta, which we have, has a terrible cup holder arrangement. I went to the trouble of deleting the (useless) arm rest and adding some parts from later Jettas so now we have three cuphllders in front. Turns out ECS tuning saw the same need and created a kit that does this nicer because it doesn’t have the unused section where the armrest lock fit.
Trying to attach the photo again.
OK I think this has been resized small enough.