Postage and Packing

Public information campaigns promoting the right postage, correct addressing and careful packing were among the appeals most revisited by the Post Office. Towards the end of the 1950s a change in commissioning policy for some of these posters took place.

Simplicity of design and typography continue to feature in some posters. A popular visual pun was the animating of the inanimate object, such as the human pillar box and lifeless hand.

Responding to this "freedom of design" that allowed artists to adopt the kind of "symbolic" approach taken by other businesses, the Post Office looked for new ways to maintain an innovative edge. Careful packing was a theme chosen for posters that were to be more realistic while still contemporary.

Humorous posters in bright colours intended to attract people and make them smile were among the new commissions. Recognising the importance of repetition, posters like Please pack parcels very carefully were produced in series and displayed consecutively at a site. This series included a cat, which was described by Tom Eckersley as expressing a "certain human appeal".

The image right shows the cat poster of the Please pack parcels very carefully series in Windsor Head Post Office.

Please pack parcels very carefully

designed by Tom Eckersley, 1957 (POST 110/2592)

Please pack parcels very carefully was part of a public information campaign that promoted the careful packing of the oddly shaped and fragile objects that were sent through the post.  As well as this Staffordshire dog, Eckersley produced posters featuring a cat, pig and jug in the series.  Each of these broken items has a tear drop under one eye.

Pack your parcels carefully

designed by Hans Unger, 1960 (POST 110/2606)

4d minimum foreign rate

designed by Tom Eckersley, 1951 (POST 110/3210)

Address your mail clearly & correctly

designed by Leonard Beaumont, 1957 (POST 110/2591)