In advertising, the first impression is also the last impression, which is why it’s so crucial for advertisers to get their slogans and catchphrases right the first time around.
From the ubiquitous ‘90s “Got Milk?” campaign to Capitol One's “What's in your wallet?” the right string of words can mean the difference between a generation-defining pop culture phenomenon and an accuracy lawsuit (the latter of which actually happened to Red Bull, which does not, in fact, give anyone wings).
Some of the most famous taglines have not only become synonymous with their brands, they have wedged themselves into our popular psyche — think: slogans like Nike’s “Just Do It,” Burger King’s “Have It Your Way,” or L’Oréal’s “Because You’re Worth It.” Here are eight of the most famous ad slogans that have found a home in our everyday lexicon.
Got milk?
Few ad slogans have left a legacy as pervasive as this one, which was born in the mid-’90s after Jon Steel, a partner at the San Francisco-based advertising firm Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, discovered that asking a focus group to forgo milk for a week had dramatic consequences.
Participants felt lost without their daily intake of the dairy product (what to put in their coffee? On their cereal?), and so the California Milk Processor Board’s “Got Milk?” campaign was born. In the decades since, it's spurred a slew of humorous TV commercials and print ads featuring everyone from Naomi Campbell to Dennis Rodman to Kermit the Frog with a trademark milk mustache.
The campaign’s influence has also sparked countless spoofs, including parody campaigns featuring characters from Star Wars and The Office.
Maybe she’s born with it. Maybe it’s Maybelline.
You know a slogan is catchy when many people still cling to it even after the company has changed it. The makeup line Maybelline’s sing-song slogan is so deeply ingrained into consumers’ psyches that many of us can literally hear the jingle whenever we read the two-sentence tagline.
In 2016, the brand changed its slogan to “Make It Happen,” but many folks have a hard time letting go of that original, memorable line, which debuted in 1914.
Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.
State Farm’s jingle is catchy, and still very much a part of its television and radio advertisement campaigns — though, unbeknownst to many loyal customers, it has a second, newer slogan as well.
In 2022, the insurance company underwent a bit of a rebrand, instating the new slogan “Here to help life go right.” The hope was to remind customers that State Farm goes above and beyond just selling insurance; it also offers other services, such as helping families save for college. Still, the original slogan, which the company has used since 1971, is the primary one that sticks in viewers’ and listeners’ minds.
Capital One: What’s in your wallet?
Sometimes brands and their spokespeople are so enmeshed that it’s hard to imagine one without the other. And so it was for a while with Capital One’s slogan and its main spokesperson, Samuel L. Jackson, who brought levity and gravitas to every commercial he was in. In 2020, the actor was even reunited with his Pulp Fiction costar John Travolta for the company’s holiday campaign.
In the years since Capital One’s founding in 1994, other A-list actors have also lent their acting chops and voices to the company’s slogan, adding star power to the brand’s messaging. Jennifer Garner, Alec Baldwin, and Taylor Swift are just three such megastars who’ve asked America, “What’s in your wallet?”
Anything is possible when your man smells like Old Spice and not a lady. I’m on a horse.
One of the most buzzed-about commercials from the 2010 Super Bowl was for, of all things, deodorant. And not just any deodorant: Old Spice, a scent previously most associated with middle schoolers learning about hygiene.
In the ad, handsome actor Isaiah Mustafa speaks to the viewer directly in a booming, over-the-top voice as he reveals himself to be in several impossible, humorous situations: turning tickets into diamonds and riding a horse backwards, for instance. The commercial was a trending topic on Twitter for weeks, and spawned countless spoofs.
Silly rabbit, Trix are for kids!
No Saturday morning cartoon marathon is ever complete without a good number of sugary cereal commercials, and Trix has one of the most memorable. In the animated ads, the Trix rabbit tries to come up with schemes to steal a bowl of cereal from kids, but always, unfortunately, fails — at which point, the kids typically roll their eyes, grin, and tell the poor woodland creature, “Silly rabbit, Trix are for kids!”
The commercial, or some form of it, has been around since the late 1960s, but the rabbit has only gotten to eat some cereal a handful of times, including three times as the result of a box top mail-in contest.
Can you hear me now?
In 2002, Verizon kicked off their “Test Man” campaign, featuring a bespectacled man asking the question “Can you hear me now?” repeatedly while popping up in obscure or unexpected places: from a sewer in Chinatown; out in the wheat fields of the countryside; atop a snowy mountain in the middle of nowhere.
For the next nine years, actor Paul Marcarelli continued to test out his signal in different spots around the globe. But then, in 2011, when his contract was up, Marcarelli was approached by Sprint to be its new spokesperson — thereby bringing his trademark character over to the competitor’s side, giving a whole new meaning to “switching services.”
Pardon me, would you have any Grey Poupon?
The year was 1981. The commercial: two dapper men being driven in fancy cars roll up to a traffic light at the same time. One asks the other, in an upper crust British accent, if he might have any mustard to spare. Though the product itself is rather ordinary, the commercial concept was not, and therefore an entire pop culture phenomenon was born.
In 2013, the brand revitalized its iconic TV ad with an extended version of the original clip. In this one, the man who borrows the jar of Grey Poupon doesn’t return it and instead instigates a high-speed chase ending in a grocery store where the two cars end up facing, ironically, an entire display case of the fancy mustard.
Featured image credit: D Dipasupil/ FilmMagic via Getty Images
