The remnants of a former rail siding serving the Mavis Bottling Company site on East 14th Street.
During Coca-Cola’s early years in Springfield, the company operated with a major competitor in business directly across East 14th Street. Founded in 1926 by Charles G. Guth, a Baltimore candy maker, the Mavis Bottling Company of America built their Jacksonville bottling operation at northwest corner of East14th and North Market Streets in 1927. It was one of eight plants Guth built across the country to produce a new chocolate drink called “Mavis”.
The Mavis Bottling Company, shortly after opening. (State Archives of Florida/Fisher)
The Mavis Bottling Company building today.
In 1929, Mavis was consolidated into another company Guth was involved with called Loft, Inc. Loft owned and operated 200 candy stores with soda fountains that purchased over 31,500 gallons of Coca-Cola syrup each year. After Coca-Cola refused to give him concessions on the sale of cola in his Loft stores, Guth started selling Pepsi. When Pepsi-Cola went bankrupt in 1931, he purchased the company for $10,500, turning it into a national brand. As Pespi grew, the Mavis Bottling Company was then absorbed into Pepsi-Cola and by 1936, Pepsi had become the nation’s second largest soda company.
A Coca-Cola truck on the property of the former Mavis Bottling Company. (State Archives of Florida/Fisher)
Loft, Inc. closed the Jacksonville Mavis bottling plant in 1930. Coca-Cola expanded the building in 1946 and utilized the property as a cooler department, sign painting department, and private garage. Built out at the two-block Springfield bottling complex and still in need of space, the Jacksonville Coca-Cola Bottling Company began leasing support space in other areas of town in 1947 and continued to do so for two decades.
A 1950’s Sanborn Map of the Coca-Cola Bottling Company.
By the late 1960s, the time had come for Coca-Cola to move on from their constrained and aging 55,400-square foot Springfield plant. In 1968, a $1.8 million, 145,000-square foot modern bottling facility was constructed in the westside to replace the Springfield operation. Developed on a 12-acre site and capable of producting 1/2 million bottles per eight hour shift, the new plant at 1411 Huron St was one of Coca-Cola’s largest bottling facilities in the Southeast. Today, fifty years after being vacated by Coca-Cola, the Springfield site and the district surrounding it, serve as a reminder of the urban core’s era as a major manufacturing center.
Inside the Coca-Cola Bottling plant in 1948. (State Archives of Florida/Fisher)
Article by Ennis Davis, AICP. Davis is a certified senior planner and graduate of Florida A&M University. He is the author of the award winning books “Reclaiming Jacksonville,” “Cohen Brothers: The Big Store” and “Images of Modern America: Jacksonville.” Davis has served with various organizations committed to improving urban communities, including the American Planning Association and the Florida Trust for Historic Preservation. A 2013 Next City Vanguard, Davis is the co-founder of Metro Jacksonville.com and ModernCities.com — two websites dedicated to promoting fiscally sustainable communities — and Transform Jax, a tactical urbanist group. Contact Ennis at edavis@moderncities.com