15 Classic Commercials to Trigger Your '90s-Kid Nostalgia
Let these distilled doses of 1990s advertising take you back to a simpler time, when pizza came on a bagel and hair came in a can.
The field of advertising is designed to plant its simple ideas deep inside your subconscious.
As a result, your brain is overflowing with jingles, images, and snippets of commercial dialogue that you absorbed like a sponge through the hundreds of hours of TV you watched in your childhood.
While this has probably crowded out useful knowledge and skills like your CPR training, or the name of that cousin you see every few years, it does have the bonus of tapping straight into nostalgia. Short of the smell of your childhood home, there is probably nothing better than an old commercial to transport you back in time, away from the horrors and crises of the present.
With that in mind, let's not waste any more time on the intro—because you really need this right now.
Bagel Bites
The iconic bagel bites jingle was a staple of '90s TV, with the insistence that the arrangement of pizza toppings "on wholesome little bagel" somehow made these hyper-processed morsels into health food. Because "when pizza's on a bagel, you can eat pizza any time!"
That's why we all spent that decade eating Bagel Bites for breakfast... No? Just us?
▲Muzzy
"Je suis la jeune fille!" If that was the only phrase of French you knew in the '90s, that's because your parents were too cheap to buy you Muzzy's cartoon learning tapes, and you had to make do with what you could pick up from the commercials. Developed by the BBC and sold by a strange woman with the supernatural ability to appear undetected in your living room, MUZZY promised to teach kids a variety of languages from the comfort of home.
The fact that kids who grew up watching that Muzzy commercial are now old enough to have kids of their own—who currently have no choice but to learn from home—is only slightly more shocking than the fact that Muzzy is still "the world's leading language course for kids," with online lessons and games in French, Spanish, Italian, German, Chinese, and Korean. Considering the current state of American society...it might be a good idea to start future-proofing our kids.
▲Miss Cleo
Speaking of supernatural abilities, no one showed them off quite as impressively as Miss Cleo did in a series of '90s commercials in conjunction with the Psychic Readers Network. In an affected Jamaican accent, Miss Cleo—real name Youree Dell Harris—would very casually tell strangers their personal business as revealed by her Tarot cards, because "the cards never lie" (especially when all calls were scripted).
▲Baby Bottle Pop
The company behind Baby Bottle Pop candy didn't want to waste your time, so they crafted a short, 15-second ad so infuriatingly infectious that you will never get it out of your head as long as you live. Do not click the play button unless you want "just lick the pop, dip it, and shake it... then lick it again!" playing on a loop in your skull for the next 4-400 hours.
Just be thankful we didn't include the Kars 4 Kids commercial.
▲Hostess Cupcakes
Before Hostess went through its bankruptcy and brief shutdown in 2012, the century-old brand was known for a clever series of ads featuring wild animals mistaking various objects for the food-based gas station treats. From a raccoon being squashed by a snowboard to a rhino charging at a jeep's spare tire, the over-the-top slapstick always ended with the animals asking, "Hey, where's the cream filling?"
Little do they know, that "cream" is actually a blend of high fructose corn syrup with emulsified, hydrogenated vegetable shortening. Yummy.
▲Chia Pets
Chia Pets are the perfect embodiment of American ingenuity. Got a bunch of cheap ceramic and some seeds no one wants? Throw 'em together and call it a pet! Someone will buy it.
And someone clearly did, because commercials for Chia Pets were ubiquitous throughout the 1990s. They were always promoted as a "perfect gift," which makes sense, because it's hard to imagine someone buying one for themselves. The fact that chia seeds and greens are edible is never mentioned. You're just supposed to grow a little green afro on a ceramic head, and pretend it's your "pet."
The fact that the thumbnail is an excited grandmother presenting a Chia Pet to her grandson—who is doing his best to feign a smile—really says it all.
▲Crossfire
"Crossfire! You'll get caught in the... crossfire!"
The '90s was always trying to sell young boys on new ways to be dangerous badasses. And no commercial did so more effectively than this ad for the board game Crossfire. Set "some time in the future," the commercial features young combatants emerging from an electrical storm in fingerless gloves, riding on flying skateboards toward "the ultimate challenge!"
The commercial perfectly encapsulates the feeling of playing a tiny version of air hockey with little metal beads.
▲Matthew Lesko
Not every commercial in the '90s was aimed at gullible children and people who believe in psychics. Some stuff was for serious, important adults who take financial advice from the Riddler's campier brother. "Did you know that Federal Express, Nike Shoes, and even H. Ross Perot have made their millions using government money programs, and you can too!" The H. Ross Perot?! Sing me up, Mr. Lesko!
For only $37.95 (plus processing and handling), Matthew Lesko would send 1990s TV viewers an 1,100-page book brimming with thousands of government programs to help you start a business or get an education. But no matter how much free money you get, you will never be as rich in spirit as Matthew Lesko.
▲Capri Sun
Does the phrase "liquid cool" mean nothing to you? Well, in the 1990s it meant that juice box technology was obsolete, and it was time to embrace difficult to puncture metallic pouches that turned you and your friends into Alex Mack or the bad guy from Terminator 2. With stunning '90's CGI and heavy use of the whammy bar, these commercials showed how an "all natural fruit drink" could turn a game of basketball or a day on the beach into a sci-fi adventure.
▲Mentos The Freshmaker
Nothing captures the optimism of the '90s like a Mentos commercial. In a world populated by photogenic mimes, all of life's mishaps can be solved by popping breath mints and little creative positivity. Did you sit on a freshly painted bench in your new suit? Stay fresh. Stay cool. Just roll around on the bench slats until your suit looks like it's supposed to have messy white stripes all over it, then stroll confidently into that business meeting!
▲Operation
If you have nightmares about being wheeled into the OR only to realize that all the surgeons are small children speaking in a strange man's voice, this commercial for the board game "operation" may be to blame. If you don't have that nightmare, maybe you just remember that shrill voice asking, "Is it water on the knee?!"
▲GLH Hair in a Can
"GLH stands for great looking hair," and that's just what you'll get when you spray a can of GLH on your bald spot. No, it's not spray paint! It's powder that clings to tiny hairs and even builds on itself! So if you're too self-conscious to rock a comb over (dear god, that man is our president now...), you can replace your thin spots with a pile of fluffy black powder.
It's truly amazing this didn't catch on...
▲Popsicle
In the late '90s, Popsicle ran a series of ads with sardonic talking dogs and nightmarish effects akin to the well-documented body horror of the Gushers canon. According to the logic of these commercials, eating a popsicle coated in sprinkles would cover you and your dog in sprinkles.
Each commercial featured a different horrific transformation. This gem includes the memorable line, Tthe colors, Duke, the colors!" and the dog's response: "I'm color blind, kid."
▲Campbell's Chicken Noodle Soup
This commercial is memorable for starring possibly the most adorable kid in advertising history. Putting the Welch's kids to shame, he pleads with his brothers, "Don't hog it all," before delivering his big line: "I never knew there was chicken in this soup." That kid is like 30 now. At least.
▲Ronald McDonald "The Tooth Fairy"
On the opposite end of the spectrum, there is this horrifying clown-child that McDonald's genetically engineered for this 1993 ad. Taking place in the always-unsettling Happyland—with the Grimace's dead eyes and the Hamburglar's manic smile—this commercial tells the story of how Ronald McDonald escaped from the factory where he was mad by trading his teeth for a pair of shoes.
On the bright side, the tiny, ghoulish creature in the commercial is ageless and eternal, so he can never "grow up" and make you feel old.
▲Now don't you feel like a kid again? And don't you want to buy all that stuff?