---
title: '"The Good Shopper" (Empire Marketing Board)'
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/good-shopper-emb/
description: An Empire Marketing Board poster casts buying Empire-grown goods as an ordinary household virtue, folding a state advertising campaign into the persona…
section: Collection
---

[Collection](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/)

[!["The Good Shopper" (Empire Marketing Board)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/good-shopper-emb.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/good-shopper-emb.jpg)

# "The Good Shopper" (Empire Marketing Board)

An Empire Marketing Board poster casts buying Empire-grown goods as an ordinary household virtue, folding a state advertising campaign into the persona of a sensible shopper rather than naming it as government messaging.

- **Date:** 1930
- **Period:** [Interwar](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#era=interwar)
- **Made by:** Empire Marketing Board (United Kingdom)
- **Region:** [Western and Central Europe](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#region=western-central-europe)
- **Country:** [United Kingdom](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#country=united-kingdom)
- **Medium:** [Poster](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#medium=poster)
- **Issuer type:** [State](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#actor=state)
- **Regime:** [Macdonald Government](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#regime=macdonald-government)
- **Leader:** [Ramsay Macdonald](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#leader=ramsay-macdonald)
- **Audience:** [Domestic public](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#audience=domestic-public)
- **Purpose:** [Persuade or win support](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#purpose=persuade-support)
- **Themes:** [Economy and finance](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#theme=economy-finance), [Empire and colonialism](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/#theme=empire-colonialism)
- **Techniques:** [Plain folks](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/plain-folks/) [Glittering generalities](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/glittering-generalities/)
- **Source:** Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- **Source:** [Wikimedia Commons (Library and Archives Canada via Flickr)](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_Good_Shopper.jpg), retrieved September 27, 2026
- **Rights:** CC BY 2.0 (Library and Archives Canada Flickr release); printed for HMSO c. 1926-34, Crown copyright expired "The Good Shopper", signed F.N., Empire Marketing Board poster; Library and Archives Canada

## Text on the object

Original (English) · read from the image, not independently checked

```
EMPIRE STORES

[illegible] BUTTER

AUSTRALIAN [illegible]

Finest
AUSTRALIAN
BUTTER

THE GOOD SHOPPER

B.M.4. ISSUED BY THE EMPIRE MARKETING BOARD.

PRINTED FOR H.M. STATIONERY OFFICE BY WATERLOW & SONS LTD. LONDON, DUNSTABLE & WATFORD.
```

Two small paper signs pasted inside the shop windows (one reading '...BUTTER', the other 'AUSTRALIAN...') are shown at an angle and partly cut off by the window frames; the parts that cannot be read confidently are marked illegible rather than guessed. The 'FN' monogram in the lower right corner of the illustration is the artist's initials, not further text, and is not transcribed.

[← Gandhi spins while addressing a crowd (1930)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/gandhi-spinning-1930/) [蛇鼠同巢之擴大会議 (Snakes and Rats in One Nest: The Enlarged Conference), cartoon from Xinsheng magazine no. 12 →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/snake-rat-one-nest-enlarged-conference-1930/)

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- [Бо війна війною (For War Is War), Sich Riflemen postcard series II](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/kurylas-bo-viina-viinoiu-sich-riflemen-postcard-1917/) (1917 · Plain folks)
- [Gandhi spins while addressing a crowd (1930)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/gandhi-spinning-1930/) (1930 · Plain folks, Transfer)
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- [Sedari Menanam Hingga Memetik (From Planting to Harvest)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sedari-menanam-hingga-memetik-1943/) (1943 · Plain folks)
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