When sugar was good for you ...



Ref: NZ 1965, Chelsea Archives, Birkenhead Library

Once upon a time, sugar was good for you .... and Chelsea Archives at Birkenhead Library has the marketing-advertising-promo material to prove it!



Ref: NZ Sugar 1968, Chelsea Archives, Birkenhead Library

It’s embedded in the many small publications contained in the archives - such as company newsletters, industry-related periodicals, series, centenary celebrations and that sort of thing. Today they might be considered corporate zines.



Ref: NZ Sugar 1969, Chelsea Archives, Birkenhead Library

Examples include: 'Chelsea News', 'Sugar for New Zealand', 'New Zealand Sugar', 'CSR Newsletter', 'Australian Sugar', 'Sugar: Nature’s Bounty', 'Notes on Sugar in New Zealand' and the 'World'.



Ref: NZ Sugar 1970, Chelsea Archives, Birkenhead Library

These publications contain splendours galore. Such as the many attempts to explain the triumph of sugar refinement and its industrial production using copious graphs, maps, diagrams .. the more the merrier!

Ref: NZ Sugar 1971, Chelsea Archives, Birkenhead Library

What I particularly like is the advertising. Perhaps it’s the colours, they did them differently back then. Or that the message was so definitive: 'sugar was good for you' - and it made you thin, athletic, healthy, young, domestic .. and gave you perfect teeth! 

 

Ref: NZ Sugar 1974, Chelsea Archives, Birkenhead Library

Happy Heritage Festival!

Author: Paul Croxson, Birkenhead Library