Here are the most obvious of bouillon tins... “OXO” then ‘OXO’ then OXO. Some people collect any OXO collectible so getting a rare OXO tin at a good price can be tough. There are 3 different types of OXO lettering,  stubby X, sweeping X, and regular X.

Bovril is a relatively well known product name but these are the only tins I’ve been able to find. Note the lower left “VIMBOS” I’ve only seen the one of these, it is by Bovril but I  wonder why they used a different name when it appears to be  the same thing as the others?

This is a rare bouillon tin.  I have only seen  three so far. It is 2 3/4” x 2”  x 1/2” and I think from around 1909.The OXO cube was invented in 1909 or maybe these guys beat them to it???

These are from 1920 to 1930 or so. There are two others, beef and Tomato,  but they always get snapped up quickly.

I really like the picture on the inside of these tins, they were put out on a store counter and you just picked out the little packets you wanted and paid your 2d (like 10c today I would think).

Hugson’s Torox Cubes “World’s Best Beverage.” What? They haven’t heard of Diet Coke???

Quite the claim and I’m pretty sure it wasn’t true.

Torox cube tins are not all that common.

These are 3 1/2” tall from varying eras. The cubes were square, so why the round tins?

As well as medical tins I have a collection of bouillon tins from around 1910 to the 1950’s. One of the OXO tins has the words “Liebig Company’s OXO cubes” on it, this Liebig guy sold jars of “fluid beef,” basically a jar of boiled beef (hides, guts, stringy stuff, etc.) juice in the 1800’s. Liebig realized that most Europeans could not afford protein in their diets (fresh meat was only for the rich at the time) leading to all sorts of medical problems. He figured out a way to make the first OXO cube in 1909 then went to Argentina where they would slaughter thousands of cows, strip the hides for leather, and leave mountains of meat rotting in the sun. Liebig bought the carcasses after the hides were stripped, boiled it up to put into his OXO cubes and sold them all over Europe, therefore affording higher intakes of protein in the common diet.

The Vigoral is rare, probably from 1910 or so, three tiny(2 1/2” x 3/4”) four cube tins from different companies, these are quite rare (I’m not sure if they are sample tins or not).

The Beef Peptonoids tin is from 1880 to 1890 and it seems this was the beginnings of the beef cube industry. It has many similar claims that OXO and other cubes came to use such as adding protein to the diet.

There are a few of these that are rare but most are relatively common.

Beefex tins are  not all that easy to come across; the rarest being the round one and the long skinny one.