----- Original Message -----
From: Richard Hendrickson

What prompted the ICC ruling was the extensive practice by car leasing
companies like North American, Northwestern Refrigerator Line, Union
Refrigerator Transit, etc. of leasing reefers to small shippers and
plastering the shippers' advertising all over them, which then in
effect rendered the cars unacceptable for loading by any other shipper.
The railroads complained that this amounted to providing shippers with
a sizable benefit for which they were not charged, as well as making
the cars unavailable when the railroads had traffic (back-hauls, for
example) that otherwise could have been loaded in them.
----- Original Message -----

Maybe it's the same thing stated another way, but my impression was that it was the small shippers who complained about using cars with their competitor's logos all over them, and argued to the ICC that the free advertising provided by the logos was tantamount to an illegal rebate for the large shippers.

KL