Who knew that the Energizer Bunny was actually a knock-off? Such is the power of good ol’ American advertising. Way back in 1973, Duracell launched an advertising campaign that compared its batteries to other brands by placing them inside a group of plush pink toy bunnies that played the snare drum. Of course, the bunny that beat his drum the longest was the one with the Duracell battery. That particular advertising campaign was launched worldwide and is still the de facto bunny in Europe and Australia.
In 1989, the Chicago office of the DDB Advertising Agency came up with a parody ad – featuring a “cool” sunglass-wearing pink bunny beating on a bass drum – to promote the long life of Energizer batteries. The Energizer Bunny took on a life of its own and was mentioned in everything from presidential campaigns (Seventy-two year old candidate Bob Dole compared himself to the Energizer Bunny) to TV theme songs (the lyrics to the theme for the final season of Roseanne mentioned “that rabbit with a drum”). Thanks to copyright laws and those execs who were too late to employ them, the Energizer Bunny is basically a North American icon, while Europe and Australia still associate drum-beating rabbits with “copper-top” Duracell.
In 1989, the Chicago office of the DDB Advertising Agency came up with a parody ad – featuring a “cool” sunglass-wearing pink bunny beating on a bass drum – to promote the long life of Energizer batteries. The Energizer Bunny took on a life of its own and was mentioned in everything from presidential campaigns (Seventy-two year old candidate Bob Dole compared himself to the Energizer Bunny) to TV theme songs (the lyrics to the theme for the final season of Roseanne mentioned “that rabbit with a drum”). Thanks to copyright laws and those execs who were too late to employ them, the Energizer Bunny is basically a North American icon, while Europe and Australia still associate drum-beating rabbits with “copper-top” Duracell.
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