Ad for Betty Crocker Brownie Mix on the back cover of “The Saturday Evening Post,” August 14, 1954.
This ad marks the debut of Betty Crocker Brownie Mix. That little red-haired mischief-maker beside the brownies is not a named or recurring Betty Crocker character. He’s part of a very short-lived experiment. He’s essentially a generic “brownie sprite”, a whimsical figure meant to embody the word brownie in its older folkloric sense — the household helper or impish kitchen spirit. He’s styled with the pointed ears, cap, and impish grin that echo sprites in a classic children’s book, but with a modern, cartoonish flair. This little fellow seems to have been used only to give the brand-new brownie mix a playful identity before the product settled into its long-term, no-mascot packaging style.
Betty Crocker rarely used mascots at all. The brand identity centered on the persona of Betty herself, plus the red spoon logo. When characters did appear, they were usually one-off illustrations created for a specific campaign or product rollout. Mascots were considered too juvenile for the increasing sophisticated homemaker audience General Mills were courting. So, this 1954 ad captures a brief, transitional moment when Betty Crocker flirted with whimsy before returning to her more serious, authoritative tone.
[Source: Bing Copilot]
Ad for Betty Crocker Brownie Mix on the back cover of “The Saturday Evening Post,” August 14, 1954.
This ad marks the debut of Betty Crocker Brownie Mix. That little red-haired mischief-maker beside the brownies is not a named or recurring Betty Crocker character. He’s part of a very short-lived experiment. He’s essentially a generic “brownie sprite”, a whimsical figure meant to embody the word brownie in its older folkloric sense — the household helper or impish kitchen spirit. He’s styled with the pointed ears, cap, and impish grin that echo sprites in a classic children’s book, but with a modern, cartoonish flair. This little fellow seems to have been used only to give the brand-new brownie mix a playful identity before the product settled into its long-term, no-mascot packaging style.
Betty Crocker rarely used mascots at all. The brand identity centered on the persona of Betty herself, plus the red spoon logo. When characters did appear, they were usually one-off illustrations created for a specific campaign or product rollout. Mascots were considered too juvenile for the increasing sophisticated homemaker audience General Mills were courting. So, this 1954 ad captures a brief, transitional moment when Betty Crocker flirted with whimsy before returning to her more serious, authoritative tone.
[Source: Bing Copilot]