Whether they're hawking the latest sugar-laden concoctions aimed at kids or the healthier adult-oriented brands, cereal ads have been a television mainstay. This is the place to discuss your favorite/least favorite commercials and characters.

My favorite will probably always be "He likes it! Hey, Mikey! (Unfortunately, this isn't the original, as a section was cut out to make room for a Fisher-Price promotion.)

Let's see: I liked the bear channeling Bing Crosby for Super Sugar, I mean Super Golden Crisp.
Honeycombs, you know they're big, Yeah, yeah, yeah. They're not small, no, no, no.
The monsters, natch.
Tony the Tiger; Toucan Sam; Snap, Crackle & Pop; Cap'n Crunch; King Vitamin; Quisp.
Man, I miss Saturday morning TV.

Does anyone actually drink a glass of milk AND a glass of orange juice with breakfast?

Don't forget the toast.

Nope. I always thought that was odd too.

Did anyone else hear that Cap'n Crunch would no longer be appearing in television commercials? I don't remember exactly where I heard it (and Google isn't of much help), but from what I can recall, because he's an icon aimed at children and because the cereal doesn't meet certain nutritional guidelines, advertising for the cereal is out. And all I can say to that is - WTF?

Anyway, some of my favorite cereal ads? I was always partial to Fruity Pebbles (and Cocoa Pebbles) ads with Fred and Barney. The Christmas commercial for the cereal was always a favorite.

That used to always gross me out growing up. Those two shouldn't mix, like ever.



I will have this stuck in my head until the day I die:

Ho-ho-ho, I'm hu-hu-hu-hungry!
Santa?

Word! Especially since they expect you to have milk with the cereal plus a glass of milk on the side. That's too much milk, y'all.



I find it interesting that in most recent ads, the toast has been replaced by a bagel or muffin.

In my little TeeVee World, I'll always love Little Chocolate Donuts. For other fans of fictional cereals, check out this list of fictional cereals.
Topic? Apple Jacks gets my vote. A is for Apple, J is for Jacks. Cinnamon toasty Apple Jacks!

We used to make up dirty lyrics to the tune the Cinnamon Toast Crunch chefs from eighties would sing. Disgusting cereal, is it still around?

I used to love Cinnamon Toast Crunch, but last time I had it, it tasted raunchy, so I looked at the box and it was made with Splenda.

Sometimes, when there are guests, my mom will serve juice and milk with breakfast. But she's not feeding them cereal. I always drink milk with my cereal. So anyway, I never thought it weird for people to drink that in commercials. What I didn't like was the milk in the pitcher.

Also, the sugar in the cereal cancels out the sweetness of the orange juice.

Cereal commercials always got me as kid. I actually had my dad purchase GrapeNutes because the commercial made them look so good. I bet you know what happen when my 7-year old self tried to eat them. Ugg - they were so gross. I even tried to eat them as adult and they still were gross. No amount of sugar could save them from the garbage can.

Disgusting? Bite your tongue! But yea, it is still around.

Does anyone remember the Apple Jacks commercials that had the kids eating the cereal, and an adult would ask them why they liked Apple Jacks so much since they didn't taste like apples. The kids would then look at each other, stumped for a second, and then answer, "we just do." The tagline for the commercial then would be, "We eat what we like." Yea, 15 years after the commercials aired, I still remember it. Sad.

Now the commercials have two mascots, Bad Apple and Cinna-Mon (who's Rastafarian). It's your typical cereal mascot relationship, as Bad Apple is constantly trying to get to a bowl of the cereal before Cinna-Mon. Yea, I don't know why I'm babbling about all of this, I think I'm just bored.

Anyway, apparently after November, Bad Apple and Cinna-Mon are being replaced by the live-action commercials and the tagline, "We eat what we like," again.

The trick to Grape-Nuts and generic cereals like them is to mix them with other better-tasting cereals. This way, you get some of the nutritional value of the Grape-Nuts but not so much that it's overpowering.

I heard the same about Tony the Tiger!


As a kid, my favorites were always the marshmallow added monster themed cereals, Count Chocula, Frankenberry, and Frute-Brute. There was also Boo-Berry, but it was a little too sweet for me. I'm grown up now, and now I prefer a cereal with a little less sugar, like Lucky Charms.

Fuck that noise! Nuh-uh. Is everything about my childhood going to somehow going to be bastardized?

And just because kids think that Tony the Tiger is cool, that doesn't mean that the parents have to go buy Frosted Flakes. I don't even see why a kid can't have a bowl of Frosted Flakes once in a while, nutritional value be damned.

It's up to the damn parents to let their kids have this shit in moderation, for Christ's sake.

I know I'm all foulmouth about this, but it aggravates me that somehow it's the advertisers faults and not the parents who let little Johnny and Janey get all fat and then take none of the blame.

I hear you, HM. It's the same thing with violence in video games. It seems whenever a child does something violent or aggressive today, video games are quick to be blamed. I played video games as a kid, and I turned out okay. It really should be the parents that are held responsible for their kids and their kids' actions, but today that isn't the case. Sad.

Does anyone remember the cereal Nut N' Honey? The commercial featured a husband eating cereal in a room, and the wife would call to him from outside the room asking him what he was eating. He'd respond with, "Nut N' Honey," which sounds like, "Nothin' honey," and hilarity ensued. I remember saying that around my house all the time as a kid.

Didn't somebody do a sketch about Nut 'N Honey where the cereal was called Nut 'N Bitch, or am I totally making that up?

I personally feel that the children-oriented programming where you'd be viewing a surfeit of sugary kids' cereal commercials rot the children's brains faster than the sugary cereal would rot the kids' teeth, but that's just me. And, if I decide to become a parent and if said child(ren) are like their mother, they'd be most attracted to educational, commercial-free TV above all anyway, so.

So.

I actually used to adore Grape Nuts. When I was little. Like, I used to beg my parents to buy me the cereal (usually I didn't have to cajole much -- they loved that I was into something "healthy"). And I didn't even add any sugar or anything to it. I would just let the cereal soak -- something I do to this day -- and then eat it when it got a little soft. One still-notable summer vacation day, I even plowed through an entire box of the stuff, eating it throughout the day. I did not feel like eating (ed: not "anything") anything else.

Actually, even though my parents forbade most sugary cereals (the exceptions being Frosted Flakes and Froot Loops) I didn't really crave them. I always preferred the stuff for adults. So looking at Corn Flakes or Cracklin' Oat Bran commercials tempted me more than, say, Cap'n Crunch. And those Quaker Oat Squares? LOVE.

More topic: My UO relating to this topic is that I don't mind at all any of the people on the Honey Bunches Of Oats commercial, even the lady most people are annoyed by. I suppose it's because I already loved that cereal before they started in with that ad campaign and I could see being excited over the cereal.

Argh, all this cereal talk is making me hungry. I have some honey nut granola in the pantry. Want.

But, but that would mean that darling Johnny and Janey would be...deprived and learn that, in fact, the world does not revolve around them, and you can't always get what you want.

I have a three-pack of cereals (that I bought at The Price Club) that consist of Boo Berry, Franken Berry, and Count Chocula. The berry cereals are only found during the run-up to Halloween, so I had to pick them up. They're actually a little too sweet for my liking, but I still needed to buy them because they're a seasonal product and I'm a sucker for stuff that's around for "a limited time only."

It's the same thing with Christmas Crunch (Cap'n Crunch gone holiday-tastic!) actually. I love that it's a seasonal product and that it's brave enough to actually acknowledge Christmas. Perhaps not politically correct, but oh so delicious.

Here's the Christmas Crunch commercial circa 1988. You could even get ornaments (one's a Soggy) for your Christmas tree. Oh, and at the end you see the much-talked about milk, orange juice, and toast combination (albeit, animated)!

I have fond memories of the Cookie Crisp commercials. Every time I saw it in my head, I say it like the dog - "Cooooooooooooo-kie crisp!"

Well, when Apple Jacks first came out, they did have little bits of real apple stuck to each little "o." Never could figure out why they stopped doing this and kept calling the cereal "Apple" Jacks. Should be just plain "Jacks."

The Apple Jacks flavored milk left in the bowl, when you were done with the cereal, was delicious. Almost as good as Strawberry Quik was.

Hm. I wonder why no one's made mention yet of one of the most famous cereal commercials of all time, the post-1984 Summer Olympics Wheaties commercial starring gold medal gymnast (and first female Wheaties box star) Mary Lou Retton. From the jingle to Retton's cheery disposition to the immortal closer line "Watch out big boys!", it was almost incomparably historic and memorable in the world of cereal commercials. Oh wait. I just mentioned it.

So have y'all seen this? Breakfast of the Gods

Those creatures in the tree of the first panel...anyone remember what cereal they were the mascots for? I remember having magnets on our fridge shaped like those characters.

My favorite TV cereal mascots were the weird space aliens Quisp and Quake, and I still fondly remember that cereal, though it basically tastes like plain Captain Crunch.

Apparently, Trix is bringing back the round- (not fruit-) shaped cereal. Yay. I always hated that they changed it. They could take out a few colors though, because having a cereal piece in every color is not as cool as it sounds...it really turns your milk gray. Ugh. Hopefully, the Trix rabbit will get to partake of the cereal...isn't it funny how so many of the cereal mascots were chasing after or preventing others from obtaining their precious cereal? I think it really worked in terms of making the stuff very desirable, to kids anyway.

I love Grape Nuts. Always have. But with a little sugar. (The only other cereal that needs sugar, IMO, is unsweetened Shredded Wheat. Too much on its own, but with a little sugar it's damn good.)

Those creatures in the tree of the first panel...anyone remember what cereal they were the mascots for? I remember having magnets on our fridge shaped like those characters.

Freakies. They were actually pretty good...They tasted kind of like Cap'N Crunch. Speaking of which, he and his whole crew are being dumped? Seadog, Jean Lafoote (The Barefoot Pirate), The Crunchberry Beast, Smedley The Elephant, everyone? That sucks.

Slightly off topic, but I am surprised that I've never heard anyone on SportsCenter make some sort of cereal joke about Coco Crisp.
("Coco Crisp scores...part of your complete breakfast...Red Sox up by 2")

IIRC, there's some new mandate that cereals that don't meet certain nutritional requirements will be barred from airing commercials specifically aimed towards kids. So no more Cap'n, Tony, or Toucan Sam, unless the cereal companies want to fortify the hell out of those cereals to make them acceptable.

On another note, this article makes me laugh, plus it has a bunch of the old-school cereal commercials as a bonus.

Aww, Mary Lou Retton. That's a good memory from growing up in the 80s. She was so perky and happy and wholesome. If she was around now she would be pressured into doing Stuff magazine covers.

Who was the last female athlete to get a cereal commercial or to get on a cereal box? Do the cereal companies even do this at all anymore?

Do coaches count? Lady Vols basketball coach Pat Summitt was on the Wheaties box recently (within the past year).

Wheaties is it, as far as I know. But then, Wheaties was pretty much the only cereal that did the athlete-endorsement thing regularly in the past, too.

Here is one article about it. Will cutting out Tony the Tiger really make kids prefer Special K to Frosted Flakes? Somehow, I doubt it. Isn't it ultimately what you buy to bring home to your family? But, I don't have kids. Moms, care to weigh in?

When I was a kid, I wanted Cookie Crisp so bad. The commericals made it look so awesome.. little chocolate chip cookies!! We got them occasionally.

Not only do I remember this, but I still think this in my head on occasion, because I am inherently 12 years old.

And I vaguely remember "Nut N Bitch" -- that seems a bit risque for SNL, maybe it was a Mad TV sketch? I feel like it was something that I watched but wasn't supposed to be watching, like the babysitter let me watch Mad TV or something like that.

Does anyone remember the cereal Nut N' Honey? The commercial featured a husband eating cereal in a room, and the wife would call to him from outside the room asking him what he was eating. He'd respond with, "Nut N' Honey," which sounds like, "Nothin' honey," and hilarity ensued. I remember saying that around my house all the time as a kid.

Didn't they have to pull one of those ads because of complaints from gays? It was the one with the cowboys asking the cook what was for breakfast, and when he said "Nut-n, honey", they all pulled their guns on him.

I loved that commercial when I was a kid! I used to walk around my house singing that very song during the holidays. Good times.

Anyone remember Pop-Tarts cereal? I never had it, but I always wondered what it tasted like. Seemed gross to me.

We rarely had cold cereal at my house growing up. Breakfast was always oatmeal or Coco Wheats. So when my mom would let us pick out a cereal, it was a big deal. Cookie Crisp was our favorite.

I used to always want Lucky Charms so badly and my mother refused to buy it for us. Oddly enough, she had no problem with any other sugary cereals - we had Frosted Flakes, Cocoa Puffs, Cap'n Crunch (with Crunchberries!) and even Count Chocula, Frankenberry, and BooBerry.

But she drew the line at that evil Leprechaun. I have no idea why.

Maybe it was the marshmallows? My mom wouldn't buy us any cereal with marshmallows or chocolate in them, which meant no Cookie Crisp, Lucky Charms, Cocoa Puffs, etc. But she was totally okay with other cereals like Fruity Pebbles and Cap'n Crunch, which have to have as much (if not more) sugar in them as chocolate or marshmallow cereals. However, we had a grandmother who would spoil us rotten, so we got our "bad cereal" fix whenever we spent a weekend at Grandma's.

On topic, I have an old tape with kids TV shows from roughly 1992-1993. One of the commercials was one of the old Apple Jacks commercials ("Why do you eat them if they don't taste like apples?") featuring a preteen Julia Stiles.

So I guess you weren't a big fan of the short-lived "Kelloggs OJs" cereal? http://vaiden.net/kelloggs_ojs.jpg

Any idea when that changed? I honestly never had the cereal much (it was always Cheerios if Mom picked, Golden Grahams if I did). But I do remember commercials that used to go "Apple-y apples, Jack-y jacks!" before switching to "we eat what we like." And I thought for crying out loud, doesn't anyone at the company know what the cereal actually is?

Boo Berry and Frankenberry have marshmallows too, though. Maybe she just hates leprechauns.

For your viewing pleasure - that commercial.

At least that sounds more appetizing(to me, at least)than what this
commercial suggests. BLECH!

What's frightening is that I do remember that commercial exactly, as I was watching it, was literally reciting the lines along with the people -- but didn't realize Julia Stiles was in it.

The complete, unedited Mikey commercial has been posted!
(Following a word from Oscar Mayer).

She's on a billboard I see everyday for some new hip replacement procedure.



Wasn't there another short-lived one, maybe with a mummy? They don't make the Fruit Brute one anymore, do they?



That commercial lies! "But it's only here 'til Christmas..." Bah! I used to work for Quaker's marketing company, and I logged a lot of miles running around to every grocery store in a two hundred mile radius slapping $1.00-off instant coupons on those things the week after Christmas (and tap dancing around irate store managers who wanted to know what they were supposed to do with the pallet of the stuff they still had in their back room.) By the time Valentine's Day rolled around, it was usually gone, having been marked down well below cost.

I have distinct memories of a little kid and a few cartoon characters shilling for cereal by saying the word "indubitably" a lot. I have no idea what kind of cereal the ad was for and I don't know why the word indubitably was so important, but I've always remembered the word because of that commercial!

Is this the commercial? It's not what I thought of when I was reading your post, but it's what I found when I searched.

Oh my goodness, that's exactly it, thank you! That commercial is...bizarre. Is that really what I grew up on? How am I not more weird?

Heh. Those animals are a little scary. You're welcome.

Here's X-Entertainment's take on the commercial(and cereal).

God, I'm old. I never saw that commercial before.

I'm older. I remember the first time Crispy Critters were available. I don't know how they tasted the second time, but the first time, they were pretty much Cheerios in animal shapes, not ersatz animal crackers. Just an oat cereal with a really light sugar glaze.

My childhood, right there-

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sLvgZj9IUcg

I totally remember that commerical. I didn't know that was Julia Stiles, either.