Patco Enterprises is the name I use as an umbrella to keep everything else under.
"Fruit Crate Labels (dot) Com" is the active part of the business I do with labels, buying, selling, informing, writingbooks, working on film and video presentations. Ther are many different ideas being developed all at the same time. The home page for this site <click here> is at this link. That page describes what my label business is now. The following is a brief explanation of how this all came to be in the first place. I had NO IDEA simply collecting a few fruit labels in 1978 would lead to all of this, and, all of what is to come. Anyway, here is hot it all came together.

ANTECEDENTS :
The story began simply in 1978 when Pat started innocently collecting labels as home decore. But as the interest, collection and fervor grew, the territory of interest spread throughout California, Oregon, Washington and British Columbia. During his travels, the collection grew dramatically as did the interest in western American history, which these labels represented. Therefore, a newsletter was planned to connect collectors he had met along with way, in an effort to build a community of interested parties -- a growing network of over 1,000 contacts worldwide.

The first communal effort at bringing other collectors together was The California Pear Label Collector's Association, founded in 1978, which was a subscription-based ($15.00 per year) "club" for collectors, and offered a monthly newsletter and held semi-regular swap-meets in Northern California. This club included more than 60 members annually, and held regular swap meets.

This later endeavour was later re-maned The California Fresh Fruit Label Exchange, in an effort to incorporate the interests of more collectors in more regions. This new incarnation became a free information sharing service for all collectors of all types of labels from across America. The "C.F.F.L.X." as it is known today, became a free information service for collectors, which has continually been utilized since it's inception.

Patco Enterprises began in 1985 as an umbrella under which many different facets of Pat Jacobsen's label collecting interests could be identified as the hobby began to take on a larger Coastal community scope.

A few years later Crate Expectations Publishing was started as the publishing arm of the enterprise, because of the difficulties in getting major publishers interested in label books. So, the time came to become one's own publisher, and put out the first in a series of intended books and other productions.

Pat's Packin' House began hortly afterwards as an entitie dedicated to using vintage images for new products, such as calendars, coffee cups and t-shirts. Never reproducing actual labels for sale, but, intended to bring to the public eye, long lost advertising images, general unique in character. This also included any interactions with licensing companies and manufacturers who want to create new gift items bearing vintage label images, including Pat's own personal line of computer mouse pads.

The Sample Room was named and defined as the actual retail sales portion of the label business, which contains all the currently "for-sale or trade" stocks Pat had stored away as the decades of collecting and gathering went by.

Patco Digital Trading Company is one of the newest branches of the enterprise: featuring access to Patco's image banks of tens of thousands of unique, vintage images, offering licensing opportunities to manufactures who are interested in creating gift items bearing vintage images world-wide.

Patco Records: Also,affiliated with Patco is the musical career of Pat Jacobsen, bassist and vocalist. For information on his resume, availability for recording and producing, etc, follow his links to the Hasbeenwannabees section of this site.

Patco Internet, is the branch of Patco Enterprises representing Pat's interests and skills in computers, computing and Internet technologies. This department offers information, consulting services, etc., on computing in the Mac or PC environments, web site design, development, marketing and education.

The Eccentricities Department is a conglomeration of miscellaneous other interests held by Patco's founder, Including fishing (for river and lake trout mostly), Aurora H.O. scale electric racing cars (leftover from childhood), cigar label collecting (a 1990s collecting interest), and interesting, non-pornographic 3-D erotica (deco era lamps and statuary mostly).

(For further information about founder Pat Jacobsen, <click here>).

(Page last updated: 1.1.99)