Happy December, my dear readers. I found a real treat for you today!
This year, Toys"R"Us is running this new commercial campaign where these kids put on a toy-themed newscast. While I was reading some of my advertising blogs, I came upon this one "newscast" that said eighty percent of kids today don't know the classic Toys"R"Us jingle. That inspired me to look around a bit and find some old toy commercials. I found this really great one!
Now, this isn't really a Christmas commercial. I get that. But don't Toys"R"Us and Christmas go hand in hand?
This spot for Toys"R"Us (which, by the way, is really awkward to type out) first aired back in 1984. There were about a million of these commercials back in the day, each featuring that damn earworm of a jingle. This one is particularly memorable, however, because of its all-star cast. Let's take a look at two characters in particular:
This little red-haired girl may look familiar to a lot of you. That's because she's an eight year-old Jenny Lewis, singer of Rilo Kiley. You may also remember her as Haley from The Wizard. Perhaps you may not know who she is at all. That's okay too.
Jenny Lewis is cool and all, but here's someone that everyone should know.
Yep. That's Jaleel White, better known to the world as Steve Urkel from ABC's Family Matters. (Also lesser known to the world as Stefan Urquelle.) Ol' Urkle was a Friday night staple back in the day, gracing the homes of millions during ABC's TGIF block.
So there we go. Two awesome people in the same awesomely outdated commercial.
I've got a few other commercials which I'm excited to talk about, so I'll be seeing you again real soon!
Hello, friends. It certainly has been a while. I feel like I've all but abandoned this place, but something inside me has called me back.
As I'm sure I've mentioned many times before, it's really hard coming up with new content. I have plenty of content, but I don't really have the means of making it available for this website.
I spent the night trolling the Yoo-Toobs, looking for something to bring that spark back. I won't lie to you - it was hard. But friends, I think I have something now.
Back in the 1980's (and perhaps even before then?), this series of commericals for Hills Department Store played almost 'round the clock starting in November. Once you heard the sing-songy jingle, you knew that the holidays had finally arrived.
Look at the seemingly endless supply of toys! Look at the bad 80's animation! Look at the man-elf who's actually a woman! Seriously, what's not to like?
I think that I've been to Hills maybe once in my life... and even then, I don't think it was during the Christmas season. And honestly, I remember being pretty underwhelmed. I was maybe six or seven years old. We didn't have a Hills in our town, so we had to make a special trip into Buffalo.
Unfortunately, Hills went out of business in 1991. I'll never have the chance to go back, and that makes me sad. Not that I would even want to, really. I'm a grown man!
Anyway, this commercial won't mean nearly as much to you as it does to me. To you, it's probably just another commercial. To me, though, it brings up warmth and fuzziness.
I sort of have this facination with with now-defunct department stores, and I think that's something I'd like to touch on sometime in 2013.
I know it's a little early for Christmas, but I thought it'd be nice to give you a little taste. Just a little something to make your mouth water just a little.
It's been a while, friends. It feels good to be back, even if it's just for a while.
As I mentioned in my last post, I recently stumbled upon, and later digitized, a lot of commercials from my childhood. Since then, I have posted them up on the YouTubes, and I'll talk about them one by one.
Out of all the cool stuff that I uploaded, there's one commercial in particular that's getting viewed a lot more than the others, and I wish I knew why. While most of my commercials have 20-30 views each, this one has 443 as of today.
That poor rabbit. All he wants is some delicious Trix cereal. He keeps getting close, but then something always blows his cover.
I really wish I could explain why this video is so overwhelmingly popular compared to my others. Is there some sort of Trix campaign going on? Did the rabbit finally get his hands on this delicious, delicious cereal?
So many questions, yet so few answers. Such is life, I suppose.
Anyway, I have a whole bunch of commercials and promos up on the YouTubes, many of which I'll be writing about in the coming days/months/years/decades. Feel free to look for me on YouTube! I'm mrmonopoly42.
There are few things in life that I love more than a good cup of coffee. That sweet
elixir of the gods is sometimes the only thing that gets me through the morning. I'm pretty serious about getting my fix.
Not as serious, though, as some of the men in these commercials.
This one takes place on Harvey's birthday. He doesn't want much - only a decent cup of coffee. Instead, Mrs. Harvey serves him a cup of mud. He really rips into her, calling her coffee undrinkable and harsh. He sort of hints that he's going to start sleeping with the girls at work, because they can make better coffee on their hotplates!
Later that day, Mrs. Harvey is telling her friend about this incident. Her friend, of course, isn't even phased by it. She suggests that using Folgers instant coffee will fix everything. After all, it's just as good as freshly-perked coffee.
So later that night, as the Harveys are dining by candlelight, Mrs. Harvey cautiously serves her husband a cup of Folgers. Lo and behold, it's delicious. Once again, the Harveys have a perfect marriage.
This one takes place outside on the patio. This lovely couple is spending a beautiful sping day outside. What better way to celebrate this lovely day than by enjoying a nice cup of coffee?
It's a shame, because the wife's coffee is really terrible. One sip, and the husband throws it into the garden, killing their flowers. I believe that he desribes the coffee as "criminal" and "murder". Harsh words!
Clearly shaken by this, the wife consults an expert. No, not a marriage expert - rather, a coffee expert! Ol' Papa Eddie knows his coffee. He suggests using Folgers coffee. It's never bitter or weak, because it's grown on a mountain. And just in case the wife doesn't know what shape a mountain is, Papa Eddie is happy to demonstrate.
At dinner that night, the wife serves up a delicious cup of Folgers. Now that she's discovered the bold, robust flavour of Folgers, the two of them will live in perfect bliss forever and ever.
In this one, Jane suspects that there's something wrong with the coffee. It's not her first time making a sub-par brew for her husband. You can clearly tell by the look on his face that something isn't right. He won't even talk to her! The only words out of his mouth are "bad taste!"
While the husband is at work, Jane goes out to the grocery store. Lucky for her, she happens to run into Mary. Mary explains that all of Jane's problems can be solved with Instant Folgers. After all, it's just as good as fresh-perked.
That night, over dinner, Jane serves her husband some of this new coffee. He demands an explanation, to which Jane replied "good taste!"
See what they did there?
George is clearly feeling frisky and playful in this commercial! Mrs. George isn't having any of that, though, because the PTA is coming over, and she's too busy for his nonsense. Clearly frustrated, George makes a snide comment about how she's going to serve terrible coffee to her collegues. It's the same joke he's made a thousand times before! Like a broken record, that one is.
Luckily, Mrs. Olson is there to save the day. You see, any time she's out at someone else's house, she'll bring her own coffee. Folgers coffee is mountain grown, after all.
Of course, George loves it. We all learned an important lesson here: there's no secret to making good coffee. Any dummy can make good coffee if they use Folgers!
I'm a little hesitant to use the word "hilarious" to describe any of these commercials. If anything, it's a little chilling to look back and see what society considered to be normal. We've certainly come a long way since the 60's. If I told my significant other that her coffee was terrible, she'd probably just curse at me and tell me to make it myself.
On a side note, I managed to digitize my DVD full of cartoons and stuff from the late 80's/early 90's. Among these cartoons are some really great commercials, which I hope to share with you in the near future. We're back, baby! We're back!
Dearest readers,
It really has been a long time since I've done anything with this blog, and for that I apologize.
When I started this blog back in September 2010, I had this idealistic vision of talking about the commercials that I loved as a kid. The plan was to bring you one commercial every week. I would tell you what I know about it, where I used to see it, and why I loved it. Having spent so much time in front of the television as a child, I thought that it would be really easy for me to come up with content.
I realized a couple of things, though. First, it's extremely difficult to find a lot of those commercials online. I have VHS copies, but I don't have the means of digitizing them. A lot of the commercials were specific to Canada, and I'm sure many of them were pretty obscure. Once I find a way of digitizing them, I feel like this blog will really start to take off again.
Second, even right now, this very second, I have about a list of about twenty commercials, vintage cartoon promos, and the like that I would love to talk about. The problem I'm having, though, is that I don't know what I would say about them. I would hate to post something, say, "Hey, this is really neat. Watch it!", and then call it a day. I want to write more, and I feel like I'm full of words. Somewhere between my brain and my fingers, there must be a short circuit. Instead of typing, I wish that I could somehow express myself through interpretive dance.
I guess what I'm saying is that this blog isn't dead yet. I'm going to try harder to bring you the Fun Vintage Advertising blog we all hoped this would be. I'm going to give you the old commercials you crave.
That, my dear readers, is my promise to you. Stay tuned, we have a lot of great stuff coming up.
