This special ebook, edited by Professor Jonathan Morris, originated in a session held at the CHARM conference in Copenhagen 2013 and presents a number of chapters in which several distinctive aspects of Italian marketing history are identified. We begin with the chapter by Nando Fasce and Elisabetta Bini "Irresistible Empire or Innocents Abroad? American Advertising Agencies in Postwar Italy", which contrasts the experience of JWT and McCann Erickson in establishing operations in Italy at different moments during the development of the domestic market, employing very disparate strategies to do so. Patrizia Battilani and Giuliana Bertagnoni in their chapter on "The Use of Social Networks in Marketing: the Italian Cooperative experience" analyse the very particular approach to marketing developed by the left-leaning cooperative movement during the post-war era. Roberto Parisini's contribution discussing "The Commercial Revolution and Local Government in 'Red' Bologna (1959-1981)" again focuses on the political dimensions of the rapid transition to a mass consumer society, and the ways that this was managed within the context of the Communist administered city. The chapters by Carlo Marco Belfanti, and Elisabetta Merlo and Mario Perugino, draw our attention to another distinctive element of Italian marketing - that is the relationship between the present and the past - and, in particular, the use of this by the country's fashion industry. What about brand heritage as an asset within the Italian market? Alberto Guenzi and Carlo Mari conclude with two longitudinal studies of brands that have become icons of Italianess among consumers, Fabbri 1905, a producer of industrial food products, most notably a morello cherry syrup known as Amarena, and Bianchi, the most well-known Italian bicycle manufacturer.