A talent for marketing
Wilhelm Dreesen took great care to ensure that his photographs were distributed and marketed.
From the 1880s, the photographies were sold as postcards and souvenirs, and between 1891 and 1905 more than 20 portfolios with large-format prints were published. Some of these were published through large art publishers (who) and some were self-published.
Dora Dreesen, who like her father grew up to become an artist, also took part in the business later on, selling mainly the landscape photographs for books.
Dreesen's photographs were therefore not only found in albums bearing his name - but also used in school textbooks, travel guides and other unrelated media.