“Let Hertz put you in the driver’s seat!”

The real life “Mad Men” who formed the Norman, Craig & Kummel (NCK) advertising agency in 1955 share the credit for a number of classic advertising slogans and campaigns that most people still remember.

One is the Maidenform bra series of ads that used variable headlines based on the formula “I dreamed I (did or was something) in my Maidenform bra.” Another is “Ajax: Stronger than dirt.”

In 1959, NCK was selected to be the new advertising agency for the fast-growing rental car company Hertz.

The NCK ad gurus soon developed a new ad concept and slogan: “Hertz puts you in the driver’s seat.”

According to the trademark application filed by Hertz, that slogan was first used in commerce on September 2, 1959.

It wasn’t bad. But it did seem a bit more like a demand than an offer.

So the NCK copywriters did some thinking and tweaking and created a more friendly-sounding, request-oriented variation — the world-famous advertising catchphrase almost everyone came to know:

       “Let Hertz put you in the driver’s seat.”

The paperwork Hertz filed when it trademarked that version said it was first used in commerce on October 16, 1959.

In the early 1960s, print ads, signs and television commercials featuring the line were everywhere.

The TV commercials, which pioneered some early special effects, were especially memorable.

Gravity-defying people floated down from the sky into the seats of their rental cars, as viewers heard a cheery vocal group sing “Let Hertz put YOU in the driver’s seat” in a swinging jingle.

AdAge magazine has listed that series of ads as one of the “Top 100 Advertising Campaigns of the Century.”

It helped make Hertz the largest rental car company in the world.

Then in 1963 Hertz’s smaller rival, Avis, started it’s own memorable ad campaign.

Those ads noted that Avis was “only No. 2” in the car rental business. Not as big as Hertz.

What that meant, the ads suggested, was that Avis was more motivated to please customers than Hertz.

This cleverly-snarky concept was encapsulated by copywriters at the Doyle Dane Bernbach agency in the famous ad slogan: “We try harder.” (Also listed in the AdAge Top 100.)

It was a jiu-jitsu move that turned Hertz’s position as the largest car rental company against it and succeeded in gaining more attention and customers for Avis.

By 1966, an article in Time magazine noted that Hertz “is being at least nibbled by ‘We’re only No. 2’ Avis...Avis has upped its revenues by 34% in 1966, compared with Cadillac-sized Hertz's gain of 18%.”

The article also noted the Hertz had unceremoniously dumped Norman, Craig & Kummel and hired a new ad agency.

Their new agency never came up with anything as well remembered as “Let Hertz put you in the driver’s seat.” And, ironically, Hertz has continued to use the slogan off and on in more recent decades.

The Hertz vs. Avis ad slogan war and the firing of NCK the agency business are a reminder that the advertising business in the 1960s was both extremely creative and extremely rough, as dramatized by the hit TV show Mad Men.

It still is, of course.

But I doubt if the ad biz of today will ever be viewed as being anywhere near as cool as it was in the era depicted by Mad Men.

*     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *

Comments? Corrections? Post them on my quotations Facebook group.

Related reading, listening and viewing…

vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv

Oh, the irony! Tax Day is also a legal anniversary of “Plop, plop, fizz, fizz…”

America’s federal income tax was first created by Congress in 1861, to help fund the Union Army during the Civil War.

The original deadline set for paying the tax was June 30.

In 1895, that first Federal income tax law was declared unconstitutional and overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court.

This little legal problem was fixed in 1913 when the Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was ratified.

The tax deadline was then set as March 1.

In 1918, it was moved to March 15.

Then, in 1955, the traditional date for filing tax returns was changed to April 15, a now long-dreaded date that has come to be known as “Tax Day.”

If the process of filling out and sending your income tax return to the Internal Revenue Service gives you heartburn, then a famous advertising slogan linked to the date April 15th will strike you as appropriate.

In 1976, Miles Laboratories filed a trademark application to protect the slogan it had been using to promote Alka-Seltzer, the “effervescent analgesic alkalizing tablets” the company first began selling in 1931.

The slogan was used in Alka Seltzer TV commercials in the 1960s. But for some reason unknown to me the legal anniversary of it’s use as a “Word Mark” for trademark purposes came later.

The company's official trademark filing in 1976 said this advertising “Word Mark” was “First used in commerce on April 15, 1976.”

I can’t explain why that date was used for legal reasons. But it does strike me as ironic that it’s the same as the legal date for “Tax Day.”

Unless you’re too young, you probably know the words in this “Word Mark.”

They were initially used in a jingle sung by Speedy, the animated star of Alka Seltzer’s TV commercials, and continued to be sung, spoken and printed in Alka Seltzer ads for years:

“Plop, plop, fizz, fizz,
Oh, what a relief it is!”

As some aficionados of obscure rock trivia know, the music for the famed Alka Seltzer jingle was written by Thomas W. Dawes, a founding member of The Cyrkle.

The Cyrkle was the Sixties rock music group best known for their hits “Red Rubber Ball” (written by Paul Simon and Bruce Woodley) and “Turn Down Day.”

Dawes later wrote many other jingles used in ads for other products, including 7-Up (“7Up, the Uncola”), L’Eggs (“Our L’eggs fit your legs), McDonald’s (“You, You’re the One”) and Vidal Sassoon’s hair care line (“If You Don’t Look Good, We Don’t Look Good”).

Anyway, next time you get heartburn as you fill out your federal income taxes, queue up a vintage Alka-Seltzer TV ad on YouTube, pop a couple tablets, and sing along with Speedy.

You could also rewatch one of the later Alka Seltzer ads with equally famous catchphrases, like “Mama mia! That’s a spicy meatball!” (first used in 1969) or “I can't believe I ate that whole thing” (first used in 1972).

It won’t relieve the financial pain.

But at least watching some hokey old Alka Seltzer ad might make you smile.

*     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *

Comments? Questions? Corrections? Post them on the Famous Quotations Facebook page.

Related reading, viewing and listening…