Trust and Investment Ads From 25 Years Ago

This blog has displayed numerous financial ads from the 1960s, the Mad Men era. Here are three from just 25 years ago.

Buy a mutual fund from Xerox? In 1989 you could. (Van Kampen's founder pioneered insurance coverage for tax-exempt bond funds.)

How do you appeal to he-man investors yet gain cultural creds? In 1989 Merrill Lynch pulled off the double play by sponsoring a Frederick Remington exhibit.

US Trust was struggling in the 1980s, but the trust company wasn't going to let people forget its impressive heritage. "Multi-generational financial counselling is nothing new at U.S. Trust. We've been doing it for nearly seven generations."

Great changes have reshaped financial services in the last quarter century. Each of the three advertisers above has changed hands. US Trust was acquired by Charles Schwab, then sold to Bank of America. Merrill Lynch, of course, also became a Bank of America brand. Van Kampen eventually passed to Morgan Stanley and was sold to Invesco in 2009.