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Story: Department stores and shopping malls

Dressing on a budget

This 1931 advertisement in the New Zealand Free Lance for Wellington’s premier department store, Kirkcaldie & Stains, does not pretend people have money to spare in the depths of the economic depression. It presents 'smart thrifty ideas' for special-occasion and beach wear over the Christmas holiday period. The depression hit in the heyday of the department store. Prices fell as stores put survival ahead of profits.

Using this item

Alexander Turnbull Library

Reference: New Zealand Free Lance, 21 December 1931, p. 52 (N-P 1508-52)

Permission of the Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand, Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa, must be obtained before any re-use of this image.

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How to cite this page

Helen Laurenson, Department stores and shopping malls – Decline and survival, Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, https://teara.govt.nz/en/zoomify/22206/dressing-on-a-budget (accessed 4 June 2026).

Story by Helen Laurenson, published 4 February 2010.