A Brief History of Advertising in the Twin Cities

1872

For centuries, the highest-quality flour—good enough for religious ceremonies—was marked with three Xs. Charles Pillsbury believes Pillsbury’s Best is even better, so he adds one more X to its packaging.   

1894

The University of Minnesota’s Harlow Gale becomes the first to research the psychological effects of marketing and advertising using the scientific method, studying the impact of page positioning, color schemes, and fonts on attention and memory.    

1907

Benjamin Bull, the Washburn-Crosby exec overseeing the flour giant’s advertising, comes up with “Eventually—Why Not Now?”—a slogan as ubiquitous and long-running in the early 20th century as Nike’s “Just Do It” is today.

1921

A Washburn-Crosby promotion in The Saturday Evening Post is overwhelmed by 30,000 responses, including so many unsolicited requests for cooking advice that exec Samuel Gale invents a female avatar named Betty Crocker to answer them.    

1925

Burma-Shave, a brushless shaving cream created by the Burma-Vita Company, invests $200 in the creation of some signs on Hwy. 65 and Hwy. 61. Sales skyrocket, the signs remain roadside for decades, and Burma-Vita becomes a pioneer in outdoor advertising.    

1926

A new Washburn-Crosby breakfast cereal is promoted with a jingle, “Have You Tried Wheaties?”—the first singing advertisement. The Breakfast of Champions goes on to basically invent sports marketing as a concept.   

1935

A Chicago agency tasks a young Leo Burnett with updating Minnesota Valley Canning Company’s mascot, the Jolly Green Giant. Burnett slips the big greenie into a leafy little number that accentuates his legs—and Burnett becomes a giant of advertising himself.

1952

Cleo Hovel, creative director at Campbell Mithun, takes former Disney animator Howard Swift to Freddie’s Cafe downtown and draws him an idea he wants incorporated into Hamm’s Beer ads: a cartoon bear.

1965

Chicago does it again! This time it’s Leo Burnett creative director Rudy Perz who creates a Minnesota icon when he comes up with the notoriously ticklish Poppin’ Fresh—AKA the Pillsbury Doughboy.

1973

Campbell Mithun films “Marksman,” an ad with a fired bullet that fails to destroy a Master Lock’s integrity. The idea is potent enough that Master Lock’s next agency places “Marksman 2” in ten consecutive Super Bowls.

1975

Larry Shear of the Bolin Agency brings the State Fair “the Great Minnesota Get-Together,” a slogan so indelible that his agency wins the fair’s business for decades.

1981

Four suits in shirtsleeves stand with a woman wearing a dress in a full-page ad in the Star Tribune: “We believe that imagination is one of the last remaining legal means you have to gain an unfair advantage.” Fallon McElligott Rice is open for business.

1992

Bill Hillsman, creative director of boutique agency Kauffman-Stewart, fishes a tagline—“There’s a Place for Fun in Your Life”—out of a copywriter’s wastepaper basket and wins the Mall of America account.

See also

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1998

Hillsman’s new agency, North Woods Advertising, drops “Jesse the Mind,” a down-the-stretch commercial for Jesse Ventura’s gubernatorial bid. Some credit the spot, inspired by Rodin’s The Thinker, with providing the former wrestler his margin of victory.   

2002

Fallon hires Clive Owen to portray “the Driver” in a series of short films for BMW directed by a who’s who of auteurs: Frankenheimer, Lee, Kar-wai, Ritchie, and González Iñárritu all sell out in the most prestigious car campaign ever created.

2005

For the first time in the 80-year history of The New Yorker, a single advertiser, Target Corp., buys every ad in a single issue. Each ad features the company’s bullseye logo.

2014

As vegan- and vegetarianism become widespread, Fallon hires Pulp Fiction’s Ving Rhames to get medieval on our asses, bellowing, “WE HAVE THE MEATS,” in a long-running series of spots for Arby’s.

2020

When Joel Quadracci, president and CEO of Quad/Graphics, bans his employees at Periscope from using the phrase Black Lives Matter on its social media, the entire staff of Periscope rises up and walks out. Quadracci apologizes, using the phrase twice in his statement.