25 Commercials You Know By Heart If You Grew Up in the ’80s

Kids today don’t know how good they have it. My own children have almost no concept of television commercials. They watch everything on streaming, so on the extremely rare occasion that they do watch something on a traditional TV channel — like, say, the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade — they are baffled.

“So the whole show just stops? And you can’t fast forward? This is the worst thing ever!!!”

(They are also hilariously susceptible to ads because they see them so rarely, as I recently discovered when, while watching one playoff baseball game, my daughter announced she was going to switch toothpastes because the brand advertising throughout the game clearly works better at protecting teeth from cavities.)

Or maybe ’80s kids had it better. Maybe sitting through commercials teaches you to be patient. Maybe it’s good to have to maintain a schedule and carve out specific time to sit and watch the show you’re looking forward to it, instead of everything being available on demand.

Eh, probably not. But the fact is children of the 1980s endured a lot of commercials — hundreds, if not thousands of hours of them — and they remain permanently lodged in our consciousnesses, occupying valuable brain cells that could be used to store genuinely important information like our spouse’s birthdays or how to do long division. Instead, we can recite the 25 TV ads below from memory. Odds are if you were born in the ’80s, you can too.

The Clapper

Clap on, clap off, the Clapper! These days you can call someone by talking to your phone from across the room, but in 1984, when the Clapper was first introduced, it was perhaps the most advanced technology ever devised by man: A gadget that enabled to to turn on and off appliances through the use of sounds. And that jingle was so catchy, it helped the Clapper endure for decades.

Hershey’s Christmas Kisses

You don’t have to have grown up in the 20th century to remember this one, it’s one of the longest-running ads in TV history. Introduced in late 1989, the ad, depicting “We Wish You a Merry Christmas” performed by a chorus of Hershey’s Kisses that sound like bells. A simple but lovely little short film, Hershey has aired it consistently around the holiday season every single year since. Although it’s been updated to HD and given slightly different variations through the years, the basic idea remains largely intact more than 30 years later.

Big Red

One of the great jingles in commercial history, Big Red promised it would give your breath “long-lasting freshness.” It also implored you to “kiss a little longer” and “make it last a little longer” over footage of attractive people making out. Looking back, this ad was way more horned up than I remember; everyone’s mooching and hugging, all thanks to their gum. And it worked! Big Red is still sold today. We need to make TV commercials this horny again, in my opinion.

READ MORE: 15 Actors Who Got Caught Lying in Interviews

Where’s the Beef?

This famous commercial slogan emphasized the fact that Wendy’s hamburgers supposedly contained more beef than the comparable burgers at their competitors. (I’ve always assumed it was also meant to subliminally underscore the fact that Wendy’s serves square burger patties, meaning they are always visible flopping over the sides of the bun, unlike those at McDonald’s or Burger King.) The “Where’s the Beef?” lady was an 82-year-old actress named Clara Peller. Her grouchy delivery of the line made it iconic, and Peller reprised the role (and her catchphrase) in additional Wendy’s ads until her death in 1987.

Skin Bracer (“By Mennen!”)

Several men’s grooming products of the 1980s — including Speed Stick deodorant and Skin Bracer after shave lotion — were advertised with commercials that ended with a unifying jingle: “Byyyyy Mennen!” after the name of the company that produced the various items. Mennen was eventually sold to Colgate-Palmolive, although the Mennen brand still endures in a few places, and if you grew up in the 1980s and see it on a label somewhere there is absolutely no chance you don’t immediately sing “Byyyyy Mennen!”

Cherry 7 Up

Sometimes a memorable commercial becomes even more famous in hindsight when its cast goes on to fame elsewhere. Matt LeBlanc made several big commercials before he rose to fame on Friends for example, including this one that aired constantly in the late ’80s, advertising the cherry (and pink) variant of classic 7 Up soda.

Heinz Ketchup

Matt Le Blanc’s most famous ad might be this iconic one for Heinz Ketchup, where he places a bottle on a rooftop then goes downstairs and orders a hot dog just in time to catch the sauce dripping from above. It takes some truly galaxy-brained marketing powers to turn the most annoying thing about a product — i.e. the fact that it was nearly impossible to get the ketchup out of those old glass bottles — into a selling point.

The McDonald’s McDLT

Matt LeBlanc isn’t the only sitcom star with an unforgettable ’80s commercial. A few years (and a lot of hair) before Seinfeld Jason Alexander appeared as a song-and-dance man hyping a McDonald hamburger innovation called a “McDLT” — in which the beef was packaged separately from the toppings in an enormous styrofoam container with multiple compartments. In other words: This was an ordinary burger with extra environmental waste. But if you saw Jason Alexander talking about “lettuce and tomato hamburgers that doesn’t quite make it” (???) and singing “The beef stays hot! The cool stays crisp! Put it together, you can’t resist!” you never forgot it.

Dunkin’ Donuts

“Time to make the donuts!” Dunkin’ Donuts rise to massive food giant was propelled in part by these ads, featuring actor Michael Vale as “Fred the Baker” who was perpetually exhausted because he had to constantly churn out fresh donuts for the chain’s customers. Vale and Fred were mainstays in Dunkin’ advertising all through the 1980s and into the 1990s, until the character was finally retired and poor Fred could go relax.

Parkay

Is it butter? No, it’s Parkay! Starting in the mid-1970s, and well into the ’80s and ’90s, this margarine brand churned (hah) out endless ads in which customers were dazzled by Parkay’s butter-like taste, which was confirmed by a talking Parkay tub that would say, in an odd little voice, “Butter …. butter …. Parkay!” I’d be terrified of a butter substitute that spoke to me, but people ate these ads up back in the day.

Cats

Cats became one of the longest-running hits in Broadway history thanks to a heavy marketing campaign that included this ad, which made it look and sound like the most amazing spectacle in the history of the popular arts. “The magic, the mystery, the memory will live forever! Cats! The seven-time Tony Award winner!” Or, in a word … Cats at the Winter Garden Theater.

Zestfully Clean

A fair amount of this list is less of a history of memorable commercials as it is a history of unforgettable jingles. Like “You’re not fully clean unless your Zest-fully clean!” If you remember this ad, I’m very sorry: Just readubg those words means that ear worm will be lodged in your head for the rest of the week.

Nintendo: Now You’re Playing With Power

Kids TV of the 1980s was lousy with ads for early video game systems, and the ones for Nintendo were especially popular, thanks to their high production values and hilariously macho iconography and voiceovers — including the famous tagline “Now you’re playing with power.”

Kool-Aid Man

The Kool-Aid Man had already been around for decades in various forms by the 1980s, but that was the decade when he leveled up his profile with his own video games and comic book series. He became so famous for ads where he burst through walls and shouted “Ohhhhh yeahhhhhh!” that he’s been spoofed in countless other venues.

“Calgon, Take Me Away!”

Calgon has had several very famous ads during its long history on shelves, including the “ancient Chinese secret” spot of the 1970s. While this one – in which a woman screams “Calgon, take me away!” and is transported to a luxurious private spa — first debuted in the late 1970s, it was on the air well into the 1980s as well. What do we think would happen if I screamed “Calgon, take me away!” right now? Would it work? Would I magically land in my own marble hot tub?

Blockbuster Video

The rise of VHS in the 1980s fueled a battle for video supremacy that was ultimately won, at least for a little while, by Blockbuster Video, whose commercials were emblazoned with the slogan “Wow! What a difference!” (Decades later, I still sometimes shout those four words when I pick up a DVD because I am a sick and unwell person.) If you’re a younger movie lover and you never set foot in a Blockbuster — this is really what they looked like, minus all the folks constantly shouting “Wow!”

Sure

Another hella catchy jingle. Ads for the antiperspirant rang out from TV sets around the country during the 1980s, imploring viewers to “Raise your hand if you’re Sure!” What a clever way to promote a product designed to eliminate pit stains.

Nestle Alpine White

Most jingles worm their way into your brain with catchy lyrics and hummable melodies; they’re short and sweet. The one in the strange and slightly surreal ads for Nestle’s (now discontinued) Alpine White candy bar are something else entirely. What is going on here? Did David Lynch direct this commercial? That would explain why I’ve never been able to forget it.

Milford Plaza

Manhattan’s Milford Plaza Hotel has been gone for a decade now; it was renamed the Row NYC in 2014. But for the ’80s generation, its commercial, with a riff on the famous song “Lullaby of Broadway” — or “Lullabuy of Broadway,” in the spot — will last forever.

Rice-a-Roni

The San Francisco Treat!

Michael J. Fox For Diet Pepsi

At the height of his popularity from Family Ties and Back to the Future, Michael J. Fox appeared in a whole series of ads for Pepsi products, mostly playing himself as a guy trying to get with a beautiful lady through the use of soda. In the most indelible of the bunch Fox and future Twister star Jami Gertz try to stop at a gas station for a Diet Pepsi, then get into a chase with a guard dog. The payoff is pretty funny, actually.

Chrysler’s Rich Corintian Leather

Besides Fantasy Island and The Wrath of Khan, Ricardo Montalbán’s big claim to fame was a series of popular ads for Chrysler cars with their “rich, Corinthian leather.” And what, pray tell, is rich, Corinthian leather? In 1987, Montalbán quipped on Letterman that “Corinthian” leather means “nothing” and was just a word that sounded great when spoken in his smooth, seductive voice. And he was right!

Micro Machines

Sometimes, all you need to hit it big is one unique skill. John Moschitta Jr. held a Guinness World Record as the world’s fastest talker, a gift he plied in numerous commercials, including FedEx and that classic ’80s toy, Micro Machines, which were essentially shrunken down Hot Wheels with play sets and tracks of corresponding size. (Hasbro owns the brand now, but it’s mostly a relic at this point.) I’m not entirely sure what tiny cars have to do with talking fast, but Moschitta made for a very energetic and entertaining pitchman.

Jason’s Furniture

This one is just for folks like me who grew up in the New York area, where ads for Jason’s Furniture were far more ubiquitous than almost any other spot on this list. In every single one, a large group of people would suddenly vanish without a trace, and the one straggler would yell “Hey! Where’d everybody go?” followed by announcer proudly declaring “They’ve gone to Jason’s Furniture in Neptune City! Where everybody goes!” This is local TV advertising at its absolute apex of cheese.

This Is Your Brain on Drugs

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