Behind the bargains and glamour: inhouse advertising departments in twentieth-century Australian department stores

Abstract

ABSTRACT Advertising has played an integral in the story of the department store. Through advertisements, department stores were able to reach mass audiences and to entice them to visit their premises. While the images and messages contained in these advertisements has attracted significant attention from scholars, those responsible for creating and disseminating these advertisements have largely been overlooked. As major advertisers, department stores established their own inhouse advertising departments, which played an active role in the store’s operations. By examining the formation of the department store’s inhouse advertising department, its changing structures and operations, and its eventual demise over the course of the twentieth century, this article reveals the importance of innovation – and the lack thereof – in its fortunes. In the process, this article offers unique perspectives of department store as a retailer and as a major marketer.