A plaque remaining from the Big Apple Night Club at West 135th Street and Seventh Avenue in Harlem.

Above, a 1934 plaque from the Big Apple Night Club at West 135th Street and Seventh Avenue in Harlem. Discarded as trash in 2006. Now a Popeyes fast food restaurant on Google Maps.

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Entry from March 02, 2014
Brand X

“Brand X” often appears in advertisements to represent a leading brand or a generic brand of a certain product; the advertised brand always outperforms “Brand X.” Old Gold cigarettes advertisements from 1929 showed its brand outperforming Brand X, Brand Y and Brand Z cigarettes. A 1937 advertisement for Country Club Peas showed it outperforming Brand X and Brand Y. A 1952 advertisement for Birds Eye Orange Juice showed it outperforming Brand X.
 
“Brand X” became a widely known advertising brand by the 1950s. A 1957 comic strip showed a corporate board meeting with the caption:
 
“Let’s call our new product ‘Brand X’—we’ll get a lot of free advertising!”
 
 
29 March 1929, Richmond (VA) Times-Dispatch, pg. 4, col. 3 ad:
OLD GOLD
Brand “X”
Brand “Y”
Brand “Z”
 
1 May 1929, Aberdeen (SD) Evening News, pg. 3, col. 1 ad:
Votes for OLD GOLD
Voted for “Brand X”
Votes for “Brand Y”
Votes for “Brand Z”
(Old Gold cigarettes.—ed.)
 
13 April 1937, Canton (OH) Repository, pg. 14, col. 6 ad:
Country Club Peas won sweeping approval when tested against two leading brands. Here is the score chart!
 
7 Country Club Peas
2 Brand “X”
1 Brand “Y”
(Kroger’s supermarket.—ed.)
 
12 November 1944, Richmond (VA) Times-Dispatch, pg. ? ad:
BRAND X
BRAND Y
SHEAFFER’S (A pen—ed.)
 
3 March 1947,

(Omaha, NE), pg. 3, col. 2 ad:
You don’t go for those wild cigarette claims, do you? Promising you health, wealth and social prestige if you smoke Brand X?
(Old Gold cigarettes.—ed.)
 
16 July 1952, Boston (MA) Herald, pg. 19, col. 4 ad:
YOU CAN SEE IT’S BEST!
Mix up a container of Birds Eye and a container of any other brand of frozen orange juice. Store both, in your refrigerator. In just an hour or so, note how “Brand X” has separated—note its watery color, its thick base! Now look at Bird Eye Orange Juice!
 
10 April 1957, Seattle (WA) Times, pg. 16, col. 1 ad:
COMPARE!
BRAND X
COMPARATIVE MODEL
(General Electric at MacDougall’s Appliance Stores.—ed.)
 
17 June 1957, Boston (MA) Herald, “Strictly Business” comic strip by McFeatters, pg. 12, col. 5:
“Let’s call our new product ‘Brand X’—we’ll get a lot of free advertising!”
 
5 May 1961, Omaha (NE) World-Herald, “‘Brand X’ Soap Cleans Up in Britain; Buyers Delighted” (North American Newspaper Alliance), pg. 4, col. 2:
London—“Now madam,” says the television interviewer to the housewife, “which of these two piles of washing looks whitest to you?”
 
A moment’s carefully rehearsed hesitation, and then the housewife points decisively to the pile on the left. “That one’s whiter and brighter, it’s easy to see,” she says.
 
The interviewer takes a card from under the pile and reads it.
 
“This,” he says, not even pretending to be surprised, “was washed with our brand of soap powder, the soap powder that always washes whitest.
 
‘The other pile was washed with Brand X.”
   
OCLC WorldCat record
Through sick and sin
Author: Fay De Witt; Joe Harnell
Publisher: [New York] : Epic, [1961]
Edition/Format:   Music LP : Songs : English
Contents:
The girl representing brand X—
 
Google Books
Wood Preserving News
Volumes 41-42
1963
Pg. 39:
The 3M ad used the term “Brand X” to denote inferior products and raised the thought provoking question as to what would happen “if everybody made ‘Brand X.’ ” The ad read in part as follows: “Can you think of a product that would be easier to build than Brand X? After all, Brand X never has many features . . . it’s never very advanced . . . and it can be sold profitably at a very low price. You can use the cheapest materials. Forget about quality control.”
   
OCLC WorldCat record
Folk songs of MADison Avenue with the Flagpole Singers
Author: Norman Blagman; Sam Bobrick; Flagpole Singers.
Publisher: [New York] : MGM, [1964]
Edition/Format:   Music LP : Popular music : English
Contents:
Brand “X”—
 
OCLC WorldCat record
Brand X soft drink commercial: “Fun” (60 sec., finished) ASI in-home test.
Author: Audience Studies Incorporated.; XYZ Company.
Publisher: Los Angeles, 1968.
Edition/Format:   Book : English
   
The Internet Movie Database
Synopsis for
Brand X (1970)

In 1969, Taylor Mead complained to his friend artist Wynn Chamberlain that Andy Warhol had never paid him for any of the work he had done for him and Wynn said he would make a film especially for Taylor. Inspired by the banality of 1960’s television, Chamberlain wrote and directed Brand X, an 87 minute series of faux television shows spoofing the politics and mass media of the day, complete with commercials for Sex, Sweat, Computer Dating and Peanut Butter. BRAND X follows Taylor Mead through a day in a wacky television studio as he portrays an exercise guru, a talk show host, a veteran returning from the American Civil War, a hospital patient in a soap opera, the President of the United States and a televangelist giving the Nightly Sermon. BRAND X satirizes President Nixon, the Vietnam War, sex, drugs, computers, money and race relations.
 
OCLC WorldCat record
Oscar Brand X
Author: Oscar Brand; Fabulous Road Apples (Musical group)
Publisher: [New York] : Roulette, [1970]
Edition/Format:   Music LP : Popular music : English
 
OCLC WorldCat record
Black Book - Household & Personal Products : Still New & Improved or Now Just Brand X?.
Publisher: S.l. : Sanford C. Bernstein & Co., LLC, 2001.
Edition/Format:   eBook : English
 
(Trademark)
Word Mark BRAND “X “
Goods and Services (EXPIRED) IC 034. US 017. G & S: CIGARETTES. FIRST USE: 19600831. FIRST USE IN COMMERCE: 19600831
Mark Drawing Code (1) TYPED DRAWING
Serial Number 72104425
Filing Date September 14, 1960
Current Basis 1A
Original Filing Basis 1A
Registration Number 0732646
Registration Date June 12, 1962
Owner (REGISTRANT) BRAND “X” ENTERPRISES, INC. CORPORATION NEW YORK 401 BROADWAY NEW YORK 13 NEW YORK
Type of Mark TRADEMARK
Register PRINCIPAL
Affidavit Text SECT 15.
Live/Dead Indicator DEAD

Posted by Barry Popik
New York CityWork/Businesses • Sunday, March 02, 2014 • Permalink


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