This bar chart aims to show the sinification process of the advertising profession in Shanghai. While foreign agencies represented 65% of all agencies in Shanghai in 1919, their share gradually declined in the long term 1919-1943. Though they still represented a short majority between 1919-1937, their share fell down to 35% at the end of the period (1938-1956). Their decline proved beneficial to Chinese agencies, whose share climbed from 30% in 1919 to almost 60% during the war 1938-1945. Japanese agencies remained a minority in Shanghai: an average of only 15% during the entire period, only 5% in 1915 (1 agency) and a maximum of 25% in the 1920s.

The figures are based on the Shanghai Municipal Archives and other secondary sources (Bankers' Directory, 1933; Hong List, 1941; Morgan, 2003).