City Bank Ad – Feb. 1, 1971

Here’s a great example of how much advertising changed in only a few short years to reflect the massive cultural shifts taking place in American society in the early 1970s.

The City Bank ad above, which appeared in the Journal on Feb. 1, 1971 seems almost unrecognizable from campaigns from only a few years earlier, with its use of a modern, up-to-date graphic designed to appeal to a youthful customer.

There’s the ‘groovy’ type; the use of the drug-related phrase ‘Turn On’ as part of a slogan; and illustrations of people that include some of the ‘hip’ new hairstyles and clothing. Ugh.

It’s a long way from this competitor bank’s ad of only a couple years earlier. It may have been corny to some, but it caught your attention and drove the point home.

For me, advertising largely stopped being interesting beginning in the 1970s because of the change in selling tactics. Too often, the new campaign objective was to make the consumer feel that he had to buy or use a product to be ‘cool’ – instead of selling the product’s attributes in a fun or clever way.