NISSAN COMMERCIAL/1989(Product never seen) - The "Rocks and Trees"
campaign produced by Hill, Holliday, Connors, Cosmopulos ad agency for the
Nissan Corporation in 1989 got the attention of the viewing audience by never
showing the product. Instead, the commercial which should have portrayed images
of their luxury car called Infiniti, instead just featured a series of nature
scenes.
VERN (Unseen Neighbor) - The long-suffering next-door neighbor of Ernest
P. Worrell (Jim Varney) in commercial spots produced by the Carden-Cherry
advertising agency during the 1980s. Vern was never seen or heard but only
spoken to by the TV pitchman Ernest P. Worrell whose broad teasing grin, rubbery
face and large ears protruding from beneath his trademark baseball cap would pop
into Vern's home unannounced, usually when Vern was eating breakfast or taking a
bath with his rubber ducky. The ad spot's format was simple: Ernest sang the
praises of the sponsors products and good ol' Vern just listened. Speaking with
a hillbilly drawl, Ernest began his sales pitch by saying "Hey, Vern!" and ended
the 30 seconds spots with his imbecilic "Know whut I Mean?" Vern & Ernest were
the stars of more than 2000 regional commercials which were made for about
$7,000-10,000 each. The characters were created by ad man John Cherry. See
alsoADVERTISING MASCOTS: "Ernest P. Worrell"