Esesa · Arkla-Servel 🇪🇸

Esesa is the brand that brought to Spain, in 1970, a technology that thirty years later Fagor and Rotártica would present as a novelty: gas absorption air conditioning. Esesa Equipos y Servicios, S.A. presented itself as “distributor for Spain of the Arkla-Servel equipment, air conditioners by natural gas, city or butane absorption,” with offices at Valencia 266 (Barcelona-7) and Marqués de Riscal 11 (Madrid-4). Arkla-Servel was the division of Arkla Industries (Arkansas Louisiana Gas) inheriting the Servel absorption refrigerators and air conditioners, the American company that in the 1950s and 60s sold millions of units that operated with a flame instead of a compressor.

The advertisement, from December 1970 and on a newspaper page, is a small gem of confrontational advertising: a man with his mouth taped shut and the headline “there is nothing to say.” The copy smashes: “When they tell you that air conditioning by natural‑gas absorption, city gas or butane has a consumption cost 50 % lower than that of the old compression system… there is nothing to say. When you see that the service cost of the gas‑absorption method… is an extraordinarily lower proportion than that of compression… When it is proven that the lifespan of the gas‑absorption equipment is indefinite while the compression system lasts 7 years…”. It was the moment when natural gas arrived in Barcelona (1969) and butane was in every kitchen, and Esesa was betting that climate control would go the same way.

It was not like that: the 1973 oil crisis and the cheapening of hermetic compressors left absorption for the industrial niche, and from Esesa we have found no further trace than two other ads from the era, one on the back of a Vera lotion and another alongside the AFHA courses. For the enthusiast, an Arkla-Servel installed in a Spanish building from the ’70s would be a find as rare as it is valuable.

The main source is the “old Esesa air‑conditioning advertisement, December 1970”, a newspaper clipping the size of a folio on todocoleccion, from which the headline “no hay nada que decir”, the arguments of 50 % savings, lower service cost and “indefinite life” versus the “7 years” of the compression system, the description “esesa equipos y servicios, s/a, distribuidora para España de los equipos Arkla‑Servel, acondicionadores de aire por absorción a gas natural, ciudad o butano” and the two addresses are taken literally. Two other clippings, “Anuncio publicidad aire acondicionado Sesa – cursos AFHA” and “Anuncio publicidad loción lavanda Vera – aire acondicionado Sesa”, seem to belong to the same campaign (the seller transcribes “Sesa”). We have not located the company in current registers nor found mentions in forums; the file depends entirely on the advertising.

The interest of the document is twofold. Technical, because it is the only Spanish period advertisement we have seen for absorption air conditioning, a technology that in 1970 competed with the compressor in the United States and that in Spain would only reappear in 2000 with Rotártica, the Fagor company in Basauri. And economic, because the arguments —consumption 50 % lower, lower service cost, “indefinite” lifespan compared to the seven years of the compression system— depict how the durability of electrical appliances was perceived then: seven years was the service life that the competition itself attributed to a compressor air conditioner in 1970.

History machine-translated from Spanish. Can you improve it? Write to us.