NZHistory, New Zealand history online - advertising

Travel by train poster, 1948

From the 1920s the Railways Studio and Publicity Branch produced hundreds of eye-catching posters. In the 1940s and 1950s there was a high demand for railway services around public holidays, especially Christmas and Easter. In an age before most New Zealand families owned a car, the rail journey along the North Island Main Trunk Line was a popular way to get between Wellington and Auckland.

This poster from 1948 depicts a streamlined Ka locomotive - similar to the unstreamlined Ka 949, which was involved in the tragedy at Tangiwai.

Credit:

Alexander Turnbull Library
Reference: Eph-E-RAIL-1940s-02
Permission of the Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand, Te Puna Matauranga o Aotearoa, must be obtained before any reuse of this image.

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Peddling politicians - Election Days

1911 film of electioneering in Wellington

Early election campaigns were dominated by public meetings, with candidates speaking from the hustings or in local halls, and face-to-face contact with electors. Given the printing technology of the time, election posters, hoardings and leaflets were invariably simple. Many offered nothing more than a message to 'Vote for ____' or vague descriptions of candidates as 'Independents' or 'Liberals'.

From the late 19th century, though, electoral advertising gradually improved in sophistication to include stylistic flourishes, symbols and photographs of candidates. Even so, content was still more important than form, and as late as the 1920s it was common for posters to contain very detailed information outlining candidates' policies, experience or character.

'Coats off with Coates'

Gordon Coates Reform Party poster

The Reform Party's successful campaign in 1925, which was run by Bert Davy, set a new benchmark in New Zealand electioneering. Davy used the latest techniques from the commercial advertising industry to fashion an American-style presidential campaign. Instead of explaining detailed policies, Reform's advertising focused on the character of Prime Minister Gordon Coates, and employed bold imagery and simple slogans such as 'Coates and Confidence', 'Coats off with Coates' and 'Safety, Stability, Progress'.

Labour politician John A. Lee was a candidate in the 1925 election. He recalled how:

We had the Prime Minister's photo coming to us in the morning news, in the evening news, wrapped around sausages, wrapped around fish. The Reform Party advertised the Prime Minister much in the same way that an advertising agency would peddle pills, soap, corn-cure, or backache plaster.

Rangatira ferry poster

The biggest and the best – but obsolescent. By the time the second Rangatira entered service on the Lyttelton–Wellington route in 1972, overnight voyaging no longer appealed to many people. The ship served for just four years, the last two of them courtesy of a government subsidy.

Credit:

Alexander Turnbull Library,
Reference: Eph-A-Ship-1972-01-front
Permission of the Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand, Te Puna Matauranga o Aotearoa must be obtained before any reuse of this image.

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Dancing Cossacks political TV ad

The National Party's 1975 'dancing Cossacks' advertisement is probably the most famous - or infamous - piece of election advertising in New Zealand's political history. In the first campaign held after the introduction of colour TV, National's advertising agency, Colenso, engaged the famous American cartoon studio Hanna-Barbera to produce a colourful, animated advert.

National was trying to turn voters against the Labour government by suggesting that the latter's recently introduced compulsory superannuation scheme might lead to Soviet-style Communism (conveniently ignoring the fact that the Cossack peoples had traditionally been opponents of the Bolsheviks). It did the trick too, helping sweep Robert Muldoon's National Party into power in a landslide victory.

Ref: C1555. Video from National Party 1975. Superannuation, 1975 TVC. Courtesy of the National Party. Sourced from the New Zealand Film Archive/Nga Kaitiaki o Nga Taonga Whitiahua.

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Promoting the fast ferry service

When Tranz Rail introduced its own fast ferry on Cook Strait, its TV advertisements showed cartoon seagulls clinging to the deck only to be plucked off one by one as The Lynx (aka 'the vomit comet') gathered speed.

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Captain Michael Pryce collection

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Branding the Cook Strait ferries

Aramoana

In their early years the ferries’ hulls were pale green – or ‘puke’ green, the unkind suggested. They had white superstructures and buff masts and funnels. A green funnel badge sported the letters ‘NZR’ lest anyone be left in any doubt who owned the things. This livery was tweaked slightly in 1970 when the funnel badge was replaced by Railways’ new stylised red-white-and-black logo, which after 1983 escaped the confines of the badge and oozed its way across the entire funnel.

Aratere

The 1980s brought the first of several shake-ups for the old Railways Department. In 1983 it became the New Zealand Railways Corporation, a state-owned enterprise. In 1991, it became New Zealand Rail Ltd and two years later was sold to the government’s advisers on the business, merchant bankers Fay, Richwhite & Co. They teamed up with United States rail operator Wisconsin Central and United States investor Berkshire Partners. In 1995 they changed its name to Tranz Rail. Nine unhappy years later, the floundering business became Toll New Zealand Consolidated Ltd after being bought by Australia’s Toll Holdings.

Arahura

All that chopping and changing naturally changed the promotion and appearance of the ferries. The old Railways Department launched the service somewhat wordily as ‘Cook Strait Inter-Island Rail and Road Service’ – no branding then. In 1984 it got hip and shortened that to Searail.

In 1989 it got positively romantic, going for Interisland Line. ‘We are turning into a cruise line’, the corporation’s chief executive said. Ocean-liner white replaced puke green on the hulls, and the ships’ funnels sported stylised dolphins, honouring Pelorus Jack. The dolphins also gambolled across a ‘funnel’ on the ferry shuttle bus that was so naff-looking that one driver refused to be photographed beside it, and another told a reporter he hoped it’d fall off.

But David Johnson noticed improvements:

While the Interisland Line’s initial comparison “Shades of the Love Boat” was overstating the degree of change and the nature of the vessels, the ferries became user-friendly.

The line’s Aussie owners refrained from putting kangaroos on the funnels, but they dumped the dolphins. The ships’ stacks now sprout ferns. Toll named its ferry division Interislander.

Rail trips for families advertisement

Commercial advertising in the inter-war years was frequently aimed at families, especially those living in the burgeoning bungalow suburbs around the cities. The family holiday was widely promoted as a vital ingredient in a healthy lifestyle and as a symbol of social status. As this 1930s advertisement from the New Zealand Railways Magazine illustrates, the Railways Department targeted the family travel market with special fares and packages.

Credit:

New Zealand Railways Magazine

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Railways Magazine advertisement, 1938

In the late 1930s the first Labour government strongly promoted New Zealand's publicly owned rail system as a key driver of economic development. This 1938 advertisement from the New Zealand Railways Magazine, starring one of the big K-class locomotives introduced earlier that decade, trumpets New Zealand Railways' commitment to safety, comfort and efficiency.

Credit:

New Zealand Railways Magazine

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Railways Magazine advertisement, 1935

By 1935 the New Zealand Railways Magazine had grown to 64 pages, promising more ‘travel, sport, humour, thrills’ for its expanding readership. The magazine’s circulation peaked at over 26,000 around this time.

Credit:

New Zealand Railways Magazine

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Railways Magazine - rail tourism

Railways Magazine cover

The New Zealand Railways Magazine was launched in May 1926 and was published each month until June 1940. Based on British and American railway company magazines, it was originally intended as a shop organ for the Railways Department’s 18,000 staff and major customers.

Alongside railway news and technical articles from New Zealand and overseas, the magazine promoted domestic tourism through numerous travel stories, photo spreads, advertisements and accommodation listings. It soon expanded to include New Zealand verse, short fiction, humour, sports news, historical yarns, biographical sketches and book reviews.

Railways Magazine advertisement

In 1927 the magazine introduced a regular column ‘Of Feminine Interest’ (later entitled ‘Our Women’s Section’) featuring recipes, fashion tips, society gossip and notes on children’s health. As well as catering for the small number of female staff (85 at that time), New Zealand Railways hoped that the wives and daughters of the 12,000 married railwaymen would ‘appreciate the regular appearance of a page devoted to feminine and household matters’.

In 1933, apparently at the urging of journalist and regular contributor Pat Lawlor, the Railways Magazine further widened its brief to become a general-interest monthly for all New Zealanders. In the mid-1930s its circulation peaked at 26,000.

Romance of the rail cover

The historian James Cowan was the magazine’s most prolific contributor, writing more than 120 historical and travel features, including 48 sketches of ‘Famous New Zealanders’. From 1935 to 1936 the writer Robin Hyde produced a lively travel series, ‘On the Road to Anywhere: Adventures of a Train Tramp’.

The Railways Magazine survived the Depression but closed suddenly in June 1940 – a victim of wartime economies, paper shortages and the imminent retirement of G.G. Stewart, who had been its editor since 1926. Over its 14-year history, it had grown from a house journal into a hugely popular general-interest monthly. During the inter-war years no other monthly magazine matched its commitment to promoting a popular literary culture in New Zealand.