Jackson’s creative input also was groundbreaking. If you pulled any one of those pieces apart, it really took away from what the campaign was all about.” “You couldn’t separate the tour from the endorsement from the licensing of the music, and then the integration of the music into the Pepsi fabric.
Murphy, executive VP of branded entertainment at TBA Global. “It was definitely game-changing,” says Brian J. So pervasive was the first campaign, which ran from 1983 to 1984, that the stories surrounding it have become like fables: the infamous accident that set Jackson’s hair on fire and resulted in his rumored first cosmetic surgery, the star’s desire to hide his face behind sunglasses for a “less is more” effect, and so on.īut its impact on the music and advertising industries was equally widespread.
When Jackson suggested using his song “Billie Jean” as the jingle (with the rewritten chorus, “You’re the Pepsi generation/Guzzle down and taste the thrill of the day/And feel the Pepsi way”), Pepsi was sold. “I pitched it as a multifaceted marketing campaign with lots of touch points: big-time advertising, tour sponsorship, logos on the cans, displays in the supermarket and PR-friendly events,” Coleman says. PepsiCo and its ad agency, BBDO, also hesitated at the possible cost, but Coleman’s proposal proved too appealing. “The goal was to make Pepsi look young and Coke look old, and Michael Jackson was in fact the choice of that generation-he was already the King of Pop, even though he hadn’t declared it,” Coleman says. “They saw anything they would do with Michael as a more targeted, ethnic campaign.” Coca-Cola offered a $1 million deal that was rejected and the Jacksons moved on to PepsiCo, where then-CEO Roger Enrico was looking for a big idea to launch his youth-targeted “New Generation” campaign for the brand. “They gave it serious consideration yet couldn’t make that leap of faith,” Coleman says.
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