BEING A PRODUCT OF PRODUCTS

Ask any person growing up in the 70s and 80s if they can remember assignments from their school text books… literature, equations, pieces of history and more times than not, you’ll get a blank stare.

But ask this same person if they can remember old products from commercials, things in their household and yes, even the music jingles that went with those products and chances are, they won’t miss a beat.

I can remember the jingle lyrics to some obscure soda “Are you ready, are you ready….(pop – finger in the mouth) for RED BABY!” I don’t know why. I mean this product wasn’t advertised as much as the other things on TV like Rolos Candy, State Farm Insurance or Doublemint Gum – things I know you know the lyrics to.

My awareness for commercial lyrics became clearer to me when I comprehended their power.

I was at a leadership camp one Summer and an entire auditorium full of teens were asked to sing the lyrics to Diet Pepsi… (which I believe were written by Barry Manilow… but don’t quote me on that). And even though at the time Coca-Cola and regular Pepsi commercials were running double time those of Diet Pepsi, every single person in the auditorium was singing in unison, “Now you see it, now you don’t … here you have it, here you won’t. Oh Diet Pepsi one small calorie, now you see it, now you don’t. That great Pepsi taste, diet Pepsi won’t go to your waist…” This song went on and on several times through.

The cool part was when every person in there realized the person next to them was singing louder and louder as they recognized that everyone in the room knew the song. It was enlightening to me to see that a commercial for a product maybe half the room hadn’t even tried, united the voices in the room without missing a beat.

The power of advertising. It’s a magical thing. But have you ever stopped to wonder what the heck happened to some products advertised to the max back then? While I know Prell Shampoo still exists (I remember it being sold in a GLASS bottle, mind you, ahem) and other products have undergone a transformation or two, where are these products now?

Pillsbury Space Sticks, Raintree Moisturizer, Mug O’Lunch meals, Pepsodent Toothpaste, Body on Tap Shampoo, Jiffy Pop, Tickle Deodorant and Miller’s Outpost stores, home of Levis.

As time moves on, so do our tastes. As we become more educated about what we’re consuming or our need to consume things, we move on. The average consumer isn’t necessarily fickle as much as ‘curious’ to try new things. Long before ‘infomercials’ made their appearance as we know them today, Ronco, K-TEL and a few others were king at advertising things we didn’t know we needed. And while they didn’t necessarily have ‘jingles’ to carve into our brains, a lot of things that were being ‘pitched’ to us have remained in our heads, filed away for some day we decide we want to appear on the Jeopardy game show to cash in on all this useless knowledge.

But in the meantime, I think it’s fun being a product of products and of a time that benchmarks our familiarity with the consumer marketplace. Perhaps we yearn for a time when shopping was fun, not knowing what to expect… a time of fad and frenzy, of pet rocks and pop rocks….and Diet Pepsi. And knowing that one day when we wake up there will be products….where that jingle will remind us”now you see it, now you don’t.”

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