‘Touting for business’: British Banks and their customers in the twentieth century

This strand of research considers the marketing and public relations activities of the 'Big Five' British clearing banks in the period from 1918-1970, and in particular the relationships with their customers.British banks formed a cartel and dominated the market for domestic financial services from the early twentieth century onwards.This cartel, combined with government imposed restrictions upon lending, meant that banks were severely restrained in their ability to offer new products and consequently to distinguish themselves from their competitors.It also meant that consumers had limited choices in terms of financial service providers.In this environment, bank managements had to rely heavily upon building brand image and utilising marketing techniques in order to differentiate themselves and to attract customers.For many bankers such techniques were new and unpopular – they were unused to communicating with their customers.From the perspective of the consumer, the work aims to examine if the adoption of such marketing, brand building and public relations efforts were successful or not.It draws upon sources from bank archives but also from newspapers, consumer groups and public inquiries in an attempt to gather both the perceptive of banks and of their customers.

Themes

The work examines personal customers of the British retail banks in the twentieth century - their relationships with, and views of, the banks - in order to build upon the growing literature concerned with corporations and their consumers. From the perspective of bank managements, the work considers the marketing techniques adopted by the banks, as well as the success or otherwise of these methods.Such techniques included advertising but also the use of corporate architect in order to create a brand image.

The work examines attitudes of bankers themselves and compares the developments in the main clearing banks and how their approaches differed or remained similar.Bankers were relatively conservative professionals and were often reluctant to adopt new techniques but they were forced to embrace marketing concepts by the 1970s in order to compete in tightly regulated and tightly cartelised markets.

Outputs

Lucy Newton, University of Reading Business School Discussion Papers, Economics and Management Series, 055, 2008, 'Branding, Marketing and Product Innovation: The attempts of British Banks to Reach Consumers in the Interwar Period' Download (PDF-955 KB).

Lucy Newton, 'A favourable impression of banking? British banks and their consumers, 1920-1970' unpublished research paper.

The above image was reproduced with the persmission of Lloyds TSB Group Archives.