If oil companies owned the station (such as all the stations in New York city) and they wanted to upgrade the stations they would solicit bids from pump companies for a stated amount of pumps. In their specifications would be the exact colors the pumps were to be painted, exactly where the decals/signs were to be placed and where the contains lead signs were to be placed.
To back up this information I have over 500 blueprints from the Bennett files that show the above information. My assumption is that if a decal was to be used, the pump companies could easily have them made, but if it was to be a metal sign, these would be supplied by the oil company.
Oil companies did not order pumps one at a time, they ordered pumps in bulk. They would have the pumps delivered (usually by rail cars, again I have pictures of pumps being put in train cars) and delivered to a local petroleum equipment dealer who would install the pumps. If the decals/signs were not on the pump the equipment dealer would apply them while they were installing the pumps.
If Mon & Pop owned a Texaco station (meaning they purchased their gasoline from the local Texaco distributor) they would go the the closest petroleum equipment distributor and ask to have a salesman come out and show them what pumps were available. The salesman would show up, brochures in hand. This equipment distributor might only represent one pump company, or if they were in a large enough area they might represent a couple of pump companies. Mom & Pop would look over the brochures and pick out a pump. Most equipment distributors kept an inventory of pumps in their warehouse, created, ready to deliver to the station. When this type of pump was delivered to the Mom & Pop station and the crate was opened, the pump was red, the standard color for pumps that were sold one at a time. After the pump was installed, the rep. from the Texaco company would show up with, decals/signs and a globe for the pump.
I hope this helps you to understand how pumps were purchased. The biggest thing I see is collectors sometimes try to read into things more that what really happened. Purchasing a gas pump was the same thing to the dealer as purchasing a tire changer, it was a necessary expense he had to incur to make a profit.
I have personally owned or read through every National Petroleum News magazine from 1908 thru the 1980s, and I do not remember even once where there was a article or mention that the purchase of a particular pump would enhance the profit of the business. The ads did, but remember they were just trying to sell pumps.
Jack Sim