Need to necessity: carriage advertising in the Gilded Age

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article looks at the advertising of the carriage trade in the United States during the Gilded Age. The trade’s changing products and its expanding markets helped define the advertising employed to reach diverse consumers. The article also gives a brief history of the Studebaker Brothers Company and its advertisements, as well as looking at some early automobile advertising from several companies. The carriage trade in the United States, through industrial manufacturing techniques, created a consumer product that needed to find its market. To secure a place for carriages in this new consumer society, manufacturers and distributors used advertising, as they would later for the automobiles that were to replace them. The article includes descriptions of carriage and automobile ads, representing a range of business, retail, and lifestyle publications and their customers.