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No one’s worse at living a normal life than the people in infomercials, as evidenced by this supercut of “you’re doing it wrong” moments from product ads. Seriously, how hard is cling wrap, really? And unless you’re trying, it’s hard to imagine a situation in which a cracked egg might land right in the burner plate.
via pleated-jeans
The Pocket Fisherman Makes it Big
The history of pitching unusual gadgets on television begins with S.J. Popeil. Born into a family of roadside salesmen, S.J. had the vision to break into a much larger audience via TV. The first gizmo he hawked on the small screen was the Pocket Fisherman -a fishing rod small enough to fit in your glove compartment or briefcase. While veteran anglers debated the utility of the flimsy rod, Popeil maintained, “It’s not for using. It’s for giving.” He had a point. Forty years after the first commercial aired, The Pocket Fisherman continues to sell millions of units worldwide every year.
The Genius that Bred the Chia Pet
In the early 1970s, entrepreneur Joseph Pedott heard about a failing Chicago company that was selling seeds from the chia plant, a member of the mint family. He bought the company and sold the seeds along with a terra cotta figurine that could sprout vegetation. The result was the Chia Pet -one of the most successful infomercial products in history. But Pedott is hardly a one-trick pony, He’s also the genius behind another TV favorite, The Clapper. He took an existing sound-activated device called The Great American Turn-On, tweaked it, and renamed it. The rest is “clap on, clap off” history.
The Lesson Behind “I’ve Fallen, and I Can’t Get Up”
LifeCall, a medical alert system, launched one of the most popular catchphrases of the 1980s, when it aired the “I’ve fallen, and I can’t get up” commercial. Radio DJs and stand-up comics endlessly made fun of Mrs. Fletcher, the elderly woman sprawled on the floor. The character was played by Edith Fore, a 70-something widow who’d actually been saved by LifeCall after a tumble down her stairs in 1989. Fore was paid a one-time fee for her performance and never received any royalties. Although her phrase was printed on T-shirts and parodied in songs for years, LifeCall never saw an increase in sales and eventually filed for bankruptcy. The problem was that the public remembered the slogan but couldn’t recall the name of the product.
The Knives That Served Up Catchphrases
Despite the Japanese name, Ginsu knives were originally manufactured in Fremont, Ohio. The company, formerly known as Quikut, hired an advertising copywriter named Arthur Schiff to spice up its sales pitch. Schiff not only came up with the name Ginsu, he also coined several phrases that are still infomercial staples today, such as, “Now, how much would you pay?” and “Act now, and you’ll receive…” But his pièce de résistance was “But wait! There’s more!”
All These Hits on One Giant LP
Long before there was Now That’s What I Call Music, there was K-Tel, the affordable pipeline to the hits of the 1970s and 1980s. Salesman Philip Kives had the idea to cram 20 to 25 songs onto one LP and pitch them on rapid-fire TV commercials. The ads were ahead of their time, because serious musical artists of that era didn’t advertise on television, and young music buyers were mesmerized when they heard a succession of 5-second snippets of their favorite tunes on TV. Kives was able to sell his LPs for less than half the normal cost by using cheap, ultra-thin vinyl. He also mastered the records at a lower volume, which produced thin grooves, allowing for more songs on each side.
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Great Moments in Infomercial History was written by Kara Kovalchik. It is reprinted with permission from the Scatterbrained section of the May/June 2008 issue of mental_floss magazine.
Be sure to visit mental_floss‘ entertaining website and blog for more fun stuff!
My husband was sick last weekend – as in, up at 4 a.m. hugging the Porcelain Goddess sick (and not because of alcohol). So we were up at an ungodly time of the morning. He was dying a slow death and I was flipping channels because I couldn’t get back to sleep. I have to say, I got sucked into a number of infomericals that were absolutely horrendous. Is there anything Billy Mays doesn’t hawk?
One of my favorites is the Magic Bullet. It sounds suspiciously sexual, but it’s really like a mini blender. I actually got one for Christmas a few years ago and I loved it – until the motor burned out after a few months. The informercial is positively addicting though. I thought I was the only one who noticed the strange old lady wandering around with a cigarette hanging out of her mouth the whole commercial, but no: there’s a whole YouTube video dedicated to the lovely Hazel.
When I was in high school, the ever-present infomercial was the RonCo Electric Food Dehydrator. I always wanted one of those, but alas, I never got one. He just makes it seem so easy to make beef jerky, turkey jerky, dried fruit and MORE!
I’m cheating, though, because we didn’t actually see either of those commericials on T.V. at 5 a.m. last weekend. A couple we did see:
The Handy Switch. Just plug in the receiver in any outlet and then plug in the lamp to the receiver. You can stick its corresponding switch anywhere… even in your car so you can turn the lights on when you pull in the driveway! My favorite part is when Billy Mays says how great it is for kids to be able to turn the light off from bed – the infomercial cuts to a little girl in bed with a lamp within arm’s reach on a nightstand on one side of her bed and the switch within arm’s reach on the other side. She goes for the switch.
By the way, the number of products that Billy Mays endorses is insane. Here’s a sampling: OxyClean, OrangeGlo, Hercules Hooks, Mighty Putty, Easy Off Bam!, Kaboom! products, Bang! Automotive Dent Remover, Bump Be Gone zit cream, Gopher reaching tool, the Grip Wrench and the Ding King automotive Dent Remover (think the Bang! people were mad?).
Here’s Billy Mays falling into a bathtub.
Then there’s the Shamwow. It holds 20 times its weight in liquid!! The Web site says you’ll never have to use paper towels again – unless you’re prone to using them as napkins. But it’s not just for spills and car washing, oh no!! You can even use the Shamwow as a towel. Cut it in half and you’ll have two towels!! I’m glad they do the math for those of us who aren’t so hot at calculations. Shamwow isn’t promoted by Billy Mays, so it probably isn’t that great.
Feeling sick? It’s probably all of those toxins in your body – we all have them. What you need are Takara Detox Foot Patches. You just attach the pads to the bottom of your feet before going to bed and when you wake up in the morning, the pad will be black with all of the horrible toxins it has sucked out of your body. Asbestos? Mercury? No match for Takara Detox Foot Patches.
Yeah. It’s a good thing Paul didn’t get sick any earlier in the morning, because I would have totally been suckered into buying something if I had been exposed to these much longer. If the food dehydrator commercial had come on, I definitely would have been picking up my phone.
So, on the infomercial topic – what have you tried? What has actually worked and what has been a complete waste of money? Any food dehydrator users??
