There are several ad slogans that seem to live rent-free in Americans’ brains: “Just do it,” “I’m lovin’ it,” or “You’re in good hands.” You can probably guess the brands just from hearing those few words. It’s clear when it comes to marketing, simplicity is key.
Maybe that’s why one of the most famous campaigns of all time is just two words: “Got milk?” The infamous question has been posed in advertisements by dozens of celebrities and athletes since it first debuted in the early ’90s. And it might surprise you that its invention was just as simple as the phrase itself. But its history and what it represents on a cultural level are a bit more complex.
It all started with a focus group. In 1993, the California Milk Processor Board hired an advertising agency, Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, to help boost sales. Asked to abstain from drinking milk for one week, participants of the focus group made something abundantly clear — they had not only a physical connection to milk, but an emotional one. The one week without it in their cereals and coffee was more difficult than they had envisioned. Thus, “Got milk?” was born from the simple idea that running out of the dairy staple was more than a minor inconvenience; it could ruin your day.
Milk Consumption Was On The Decline
Although considered a staple in most Western diets and North Carolina’s state drink, by the 1980s consumers were no longer reaching for milk as often as they used to. Despite its boom in the early to mid-20th century, health concerns combined with the rise in popularity of soft drinks led to a sharp decline in milk consumption. Gone were the days of the milkman delivering glass bottles to your doorstep, replaced with a generation of kids raised on Pepsi and Coca-Cola.
“Got milk?” wasn’t the first attempt at steering Americans back to the great source of calcium. In 1984, the National Dairy Board coined the slogan, “Milk: It Does a Body Good.” The campaign tried to promote milk as the way to stay strong and healthy, and, maybe a bit controversially, a way to become attractive. In one ’80s commercial, a young boy — trying to impress an attractive woman — drinks milk to become a buff adult. Ultimately, this route did not succeed, setting the stage for a new campaign.
How It Became A Pop Culture Craze And Where It Stands Today
The first “Got milk?” commercial was more of a cinematic experience than an advertisement. Directed by a young, pre-“Transformers” Michael Bay, it featured a man devouring a peanut butter sandwich. With no milk to wash it down, he loses a call-in radio contest, unable to speak. It kicked off the campaign with a boom, and played into the idea that you don’t just want milk, you need it. From there, came the iconic milk mustache. Created by advertisers for the Milk Processor Education Program, it eventually merged with “Got milk?” and the rest is history.
The first celebrity to don the mustache was none other than supermodel Naomi Campbell in 1994. Shot by the prominent photographer Annie Leibovitz, these ads became a rite of passage for every celebrity from Jennifer Aniston to Beyoncé to even Kermit the Frog.
Despite it becoming a cultural phenomenon, the once relevant campaign unfortunately never successfully increased milk’s popularity beyond a tiny bump in sales within the first couple years of the campaign’s run. Milk consumption is still on the decline. With plenty of plant-based options and environmental concerns, a 2019 study showed that most Americans drink less than half a cup of milk a day. So, although not a perfect outcome for the ad, those white mustaches remain as iconic today as they once were.
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