TeleQuest Telephones

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During the 1970s phone subscribers were permitted to own decorative housings for their phones for the first time.

Founded in May 1983, by executives from ATC (American Telecommunications Corp.), TeleQuest quickly became one of the pioneers that provided innovative decorative phones. 1985 sales topped 500,000 units. Phones were sold through Pacific Bell, Northwestern Bell, BellSouth, Bell Canada, Macy's, Gimbels, Bloomingdale's, the Broadway, and the Sharper Image catalog.

Although often described today as "unique" or "one-of-a-kind," these were standard production products.

Many had "Plus" in the name, to indicate that they had features not commonly found on traditional single line sets, such as redial, tone/pulse dialing, adjustable ringer and memory dialing.

Designer phones were generally made in batches of about 5,000 units and shipped in containers from the factories in Hong Kong -- and later Korea, Thailand and mainland China. Successful designs were reordered.
OEM phones for phone companies were made in substantially larger production runs. Lines included a standard desk phone (2600 series) and Trimline-style phones.

TeleQuest was located in Burbank, CA, moved to San Diego in 1986 and was closed in 1990.
The ending inventory of 25-50 thousand phones was reported sold to a company that shipped them to South America.

Following is a sampling of the models produced. Most were available in several colors.

Please send additions and corrections.
Looking for catalog and distributor info on these sets.

DESK PHONES

Easy Buttons Made in several solid colors or this neon set.	Flexxx When straight it's ready for a call. To answer, bend it!
Graham	Grand Prix Made in single or 2-line models.
Hot Lips	Malibu
Manta Jr.	Prism Made in single or 2-line models.
Baseball	Confetti Photo from Jim O'Dea
New Standard Plus Same set was sold to various Regional Bell Operating Companies on an OEM basis -- private labeled (Bell logo above, PACTEL logo to right) Made in single or 2-line models.	New Standard Plus - 2-line

DESK/WALL PHONES

Softel Plus Has a large padded ear cushion. Made in single or 2-line models. Click to see another example.	Tilt Plus There are 3 platform angles: Flat, Left or Right.
Turbo S	Notation Plus Integrated pen holder. Well in center is for post-it-type notepad.
Notepad Plus Holds a standard size pad. Pen/pencil holder on right. Has 2 fold out tabs to elevate the top for desk use.

WALL PHONES

These sets appear to have been designed primarily as wall sets, but can also be used as desk sets. Due to the speakerphone features, the Fiero and Wall Talk were often desk sets.
Eclipse	Fiero Fiero Talker II (2-line speakerphone) Made in single or 2-line models. with or without speaker phone.
Wall Talk Includes speakerphone functions.

CORDLESS PHONES

Solo

Earlier models had creative styling.

KXT007

Later models were more generic.

Please send comments or photos of your favorite phones to: