PETROL (Petrol Ljubljana)

Brief History

After Tito's Communist partisans came to power in Yugoslavia, they nationalised the downstream oil industry in 1946. A branch of the new state firm Jugopetrol had been opened in Ljubljana in 1945 and was incorporated in 1947. In 1953 it became Petrol Ljubljana and since then it has grown from 12 service stations to 275 today. After Slovenia seceded from Yugoslavia in 1992, Petrol worked for a while with the Austrian company OMV, but in 1996 Petrol was privatised and it is now one of the largest Slovene companies. It has operated a refinery in Maribor since 1945.

Maps

The oldest known Petrol map dates from 1960 (far left) and covers all of Yugoslavia at 1:800,000, with mapping by Kartografska Osnova So Karte Izdaje Gijna.
Nine years later, the 1969 map only covers Petrol's home state of Slovenia. Both show the old logo used originally by Jugopetrol.

1960 and 1969 Images from Richard Horwitz

1976 Petrol map of Slovenia

1984 Petrol map of Yugoslavia - rear cover

The next map (above right) dates from 1976 and has the logo used from 1970-85. The detailed cartography at a scale of 1:300,000 appears to be by Ivan Selan on behalf of Auto-Moto Zveza Slovenije. The categorisation of roads - with unusual honesty - describes them as "very good", "quite good", "not very good", "carriage-roads" or footpaths.

The newest example (left) dates from 1984 also has cartography by Auto-Moto Zveza Slovenije. It covers all of Yugoslavia, not just Slovenia, and like the maps of Slovenia marks every town and village that has a filling station, irrespective of brand.

Istrabenz, the other Slovene company, is included on the OMV page.

The table of Yugoslav brands by republic has now been moved to the Yugoslav summary page.

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All original copyrights in logos and map extracts and images are acknowledged and images are included on this site for identification purposes only.