KNOWLEDGE
How Many Baby Brand Names Do You Remember?
6 Minute Quiz 6 Min
Image: Getty Images via Zsolt Hlinka
About This Quiz
In a just world, a good product would not need a great tagline to sell itself. It would simply fly off the shelves by virtue of its superior quality, environmental credentials, and highly ethical and equitable treatment of its workforce. In a just world, customers would be interested in whether the product does what it says, whether it's healthy and high quality, and whether it is value for money. Secondary concerns would involve the sustainability of the product's manufacturing process and whether or not it was made in a place with adequate workers' rights protections, at a company that prizes proper non-discriminatory hiring practices.
We do not live in a just world. We live in a world full of advertising. That means that a mediocre or even a kind of terrible product with a great marketing effort behind it can soar to incredible heights just by the power of marketing. The right ad campaign can elevate a watery, indifferent beer from undrinkable to the must-have brew of the college kegel. It can make a boxy and not very safe car the fashion statement of its decade. Of course, it can also bring our attention to a great product we didn't know about or attach warm fuzzies and a sense of community or a childhood memory to something that was otherwise just a meaningless snack. That is the magic of advertising, a power that can be used for good or evil depending on who wields it.
How many of the advertisers' earworms are still in your noggin? Let's find out!