HRC Shot Glass Collecting
The Hard Rock Cafe shot glass collection is ginormous. That's right, ginormous. Between the different sizes, logos and variant printings, there are a few decision that should be made by a new collector before starting. For instance, will a collection include all cafes? How about all logos? All sizes? When starting out, it's a good idea to have a plan and stick to it or the next question becomes - how to display and store them all?
The shot glass itself is normally made of glass. Yeah, yeah, duh. However, there are a few shots in the collection that are made out of plastic, ceramic or pewter... So there!
The glass has been released in different sizes. There is the 2 inch, 4 inch, flared, spirit, jumbo, and 7 inch.
Further to the shape of the glass is the bottom of it, which for the most part is smooth (also known as flat). However, there is also the Taiwan and Key Hole bottoms. For some older Canadian editions, there is also the Banawe imprint.
There are literally hundreds of Hard Rock Cafe shot glasses to collect, thanks in part to the different logos. Hard Rock Cafe has changed their corporate logo over the years and has also mixed it up by cafe: for special occasions, events or just for the heck of it. The Hard Rock Cafe started off with restaurants but now has/had hotels, casinos, museums (Vault), bar and renegade locations (which have either been bought out or continue to exist privately). All said and done, a collection can look pretty colorful.
Logo
There are a number of different logos in the collection. Besides the recognizable yellow circle, there official logos for the Hotel and Casino, Bar, Anniversary and then there are variants on the yellow one itself. The one displayed above is known as the Red Circle logo. After all that, the city name below the logo can change font, color and size. More to come on this section...
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City
Almost as common as the regular logo is the city tee design, which was first released in 2004. Although not always a yearly release at every location, a city shot has been sold at most US cafes and has expanded to include more international cafes over the past 5 years. It is common for new locations to release a city tee design in their first year. More to come on this section...
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Event
An event shot glass is released for special collector gatherings hosted by a cafe or group of locations. The shot glass is designed specifically for the event in limited quantities. At some bigger events, the design and sale also sponsors a local charity. Also a cool factor is that many designs were created by collectors or Hard Rock Cafe staff too! More to come on this section...
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Special Edition
Just to make things interesting, there are additional designs for those collectors wanting a bit more variation in the look of their shot glasses. These can be a limited release for Christmas, New Years, a local event or sport celebration. There are not so limited releases too where a cafe, hotel or casino has a new design for additional sales. More to come on this section...
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