04. June 2023

This ca. 1925 passbook for the provision store Dombey & Son from our collection, is the equivalent to the “order history” tab of modern ecommerce or grocery delivery apps. A unique glimpse at how advanced retail was in Shanghai already back then. Dombey & Son was a high-class grocery store established in 1899 and the location on 143 Bubbling Well Rd (today’s Nanjing West Rd) existed since at least 1909. As Shanghai grew into an international metropolis the address was renumbered...

05. March 2023

Do Chinese people eat cornflakes for breakfast? It turns out, it is as difficult to chew on this question today, as it was in the 1920s. Discover the century-long struggle of Kellogg's in cracking the Chinese market and where the company and its former partners stand today.

31. May 2021

Another unique little piece of commercial and economic history during the Shanghai foreign concessions "Solitary Island" period - still managed by the Shanghai Municipal Council and the French authorities respectively, but surrounded by Japanese military forces. Supply from the Shanghai hinterlands was heavily restricted by the Japanese and left the concession's population with mostly overseas imported goods at increasingly high prices: In fact from 1939 to 1941 prices practically doubled as...