Brands We Love

I wanted some information about products that have become known by their brand names, so I googled it.

With Yahoo. Then I googled it with Bing. Doesn’t everyone?

Has anyone ever in his or her entire life ever asked someone for a facial tissue? Would you get strange looks if you did ask someone for a facial tissue? The name “Kleenex” has become synonymous with the product. There are some brands that are so good and so widely used, we do not even know what the actual name of the product is.

Another example of this is petroleum jelly. Is this something that goes with peanut butter? Of course not, but everyone calls petroleum jelly “Vaseline,” no matter who the manufacturer is.

There are other examples of brand names that have virtually become common nouns. We don’t use cellophane tape. We use Scotch Tape. Would you like to offer your child a frozen fruit bar? Will he look at you kind of funny? H

ow about a Popsicle? Now you’re talking. Of course you could label any of these items with a removable label, but a Post-It note will do a much better job.

Do you listen to music on an i-Pod, whether Apple made it or not? Doesn’t i-Pod have a much nicer ring to it than mp3 player? Of course when cassettes were still in vogue, we all listened to music with our Walkmen, even if Sony had not made them.

I think I am getting a headache from all of this. I should take an aspirin. Oh, no. Aspirin is the name Arthur Eichengrün gave to acetylsalicylic acid. Arthur Eichengrün? He was a chemist for the German company Bayer. They also gave diacetylmorphine a catchy new name. Certainly everyone is familiar with that great cough medicine, diacetylmorphine. Bayer marketed it as Heroin up until the First World War.

Instead of the aspirin, maybe I will just eat some candy coated chocolate. M & M’s. Even my dog understands marketing. If I ask him if he wants a biscuit, he just ignores me, but when I say Milk Bone, that tail starts wagging. And if you don’t believe any of this, just google it.