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Fictional brand

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Aspen beer, a fictional brand from the 1979 film Alien

A fictional brand is a non-existing brand used in artistic or entertainment productions, such as paintings, books, comics, movies, TV serials, and music. The fictional brand may be designed to imitate, satirize or differentiate itself from a real corporate brand.[1] Such a device may be required where real corporations are unwilling to license their brand names for use in the fictional work, particularly where the work holds the product in a negative light.[2]

More recently, fictional brands have been used for commercial purposes through the process of reverse product placement. Consumer attachment to those brands in the fictional world may be leveraged through “defictionalisation” or “productisation” in the real world.[3] It has been suggested that the fictional brands represent brand potential rather than brand reality; they are in effect, “protobrands” that can be leveraged and transformed into registered trademarks which can derive revenue for their owners through reverse product placement or, more accurately, reverse brand placement.[4] Examples include Harry Potter’s Bertie Botts’ Every Flavour Beans, now available as real candy manufactured by the Jelly Belly Company; Duff Beer, a beer brand now available for consumption in Europe which initially appeared in The Simpsons; and Staples' Dunder Mifflin paper, from TV show, The Office.

Purposes

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For a film to use trademarked products, it must have an agreement with the trademark's owner. Many movies and television shows opt to use prominent but nonexistent brands. Some are tied to specific fictional universes, like the Big Kahuna Burger fast food restaurants in Quentin Tarantino's films, but many appear in unrelated properties.[5] For example, the fictional cigarette Morleys were created to avoid paying royalties to Marlboro when actors are filmed smoking. They first appeared in Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho, and have since been used in many films and shows including The Twilight Zone, Naked City, The Dick Van Dyke Show, Friends, Perry Mason, Curb Your Enthusiasm The X-Files, and Mission: Impossible.[5]

Fictional brands offer more realism than unbranded objects because they have packaging, logos, and aesthetic designs similar to real-world products.[6] The most well-known fictional brands, like Wonka Bars, have brand recognition comparable to actual products.[7] The demand for Duff Beer was so high that multiple breweries sold "Duff" beers until legally blocked by Fox Broadcasting Company.[8] Fox partnered with Breweries to sell Duff beer in markets that did not have strong protection for fictional products, starting in Chile and later expanding into other parts of South America and Europe.[9]

Trademarks have been granted to prominent fictional brands. Trademark protection has its origin in establishing signifiers that link products to their manufacturers. The mark allows a consumer to distinguish high-quality products from reputable manufacturers. In the United States, court rulings in the 1980s extended trademark protection of fiction to cover characters, settings, and objects from the fictional universe. This allowed a trademark to cover products and services that are not available to real customers. For example, a restaurateur filed for a trademark on and attempted to open "THE KRUSTY KRAB" seafood restaurants in California in 2014. Viacom sued, and in 2017, the Southern District of Texas ruled that the restaurant would violate their trademarks for SpongeBob SquarePants, even though Viacom only ever planned to depict a fictional Krusty Krab and had no plans to open a physical restaurant.[10]

Some films and shows incorporate brands as "characters" in the story. The quirky brands of Tanrantino's films are juxtaposed with scenes of extreme violence. Set decorator Sandy Reynolds-Wasco says that an object like Tarantino's Red Apple Cigarettes, with its prominent grinning worm emerging from an apple, can "soften the characters, even among the incredibly bloody scenes".[11] In the HBO series Succession, the fictional family business "Waystar" is used to characterize the Roy family who run it. The science fiction series Severance introduces the fictional "Lumon" brand and intentionally presents it in a negative light, as cold and dystopian.[11]

Well-known fictional brands

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Acme

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Acme Corporation
Acme logo

The Acme Corporation is a fictional manufacturer of a vast range of products.[12] The Acme products first appeared in silent films, but are most associated with cartoons, especially those of Warner Bros.[13] There are many backronyms to explain the word, but Acme is Greek for "zenith" or "peak". During the Second Industrial Revolution, "Acme" used as a brand name for many mass-produced consumer goods, in part for the benefit of appearing at the front of alphabetical listings like a telephone directory or mail order catalog. Acme products are known to fail in outlandish ways that result in cartoon violence.[12]

Duff

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Can reading The Legendary Duff Beer Bier Cerveza
German
Can reading Duff Beer brewed in Australia
Australian
Unofficial cans of "Duff" beer

Duff Beer began as a fictional brand in The Simpsons.[12] Beers using the Duff branding have been brewed in a number of countries, resulting in legal battles with varying results. An official version is sold in three variations near the Simpsons Ride at Universal Studios. In 2015, 20th Century Fox, the producer of The Simpsons, began selling licensed Duff beer in Chile, with a view to driving out brandjacking.[9][14] In 2016, Time included Duff Beer in a list of the most influential fictional companies of all time.[15]

Finder-Spyder

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Finder-Spyder is a fictional Web search engine that appears in numerous television shows, used in the same manner as the fictitious 555 telephone number in TV and film.[16][17] It has been called "an unofficial, open source stand-in for Google and its competitors" (used as a legality-free alternative to a brand-name product),[16] and "the most popular search engine in the TV universe."[18] Finder-Spyder appears as a top 10 pick in "best fictional brand" lists by various online media, along with Oceanic Airlines, Morley cigarettes, Acme Corporation, and others.[19][20]

Morley

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Morley is a fictional brand of cigarettes with packaging that resembles Marlboro cigarettes. The name "Morley" is a reference to "Marleys", a once-common nickname for Marlboro cigarettes.[21] Television programs began using Morleys in an era where Tobacco companies were allowed to sponsor television shows and pay for product placement. If no company agreed on a deal for product placement, producers would use a non-branded product like the fictional Morleys.[22] Morleys are produced by The Earl Hays Press, a Hollywood prop packaging service.[23]

Pear

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Sitcom shows on the TV channel Nickelodeon often parody tech company Apple and its products by using fake tech products from the fictional “Pear” company - such as the PearPhone (a parody of the iPhone) and the PearPad (a parody of the iPad). These parodies would often appear in the Nickelodeon sitcoms iCarly, Victorious, Sam & Cat and Henry Danger.[24]

Wonka

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Wonka bars from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005) on display

In 1964, Roald Dahl wrote Charlie and the Chocolate Factory set within the fictional Wonka Chocolate Factory. The story included several fictional candy products including the Everlasting Gobstopper and the Wonka Bar. The 1971 musical Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory was an adaptation of Dahl's work funded by Quaker Oats who also produced a variety of Wonka candy through their subsidiary Sunline. These candy products were largely unsuccessful and Quaker sold off Sunline by 1972.[25] Sunline continued to make Wonka branded candy and was later acquired by Nestle.[26] Although initially involved in the musical, Dahl left the project and disowned the 1971 film. After his death, Dahl's family became involved with a second film adaptation, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005). This again featured Wonka branded products.[27]

Fictional brands lists

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See also

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References

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  1. ^ Robin Andersen, Jonathan Gray, Battleground: The Media (2008), p. 386.
  2. ^ Jean-Marc Lehu, Branded Entertainment: Product Placement & Brand Strategy in the Entertainment Business (2007), p. 144.
  3. ^ Virtual-fictionalbrands paper
  4. ^ Muzellec, Laurent; Lynn, Theodore; Lambkin, Mary (2012). "Branding in fictional and virtual environments". European Journal of Marketing. 46 (6): 811–826. doi:10.1108/03090561211214618.
  5. ^ a b Berkowitz, Joe (27 June 2016). "An Infographic Look At The Fake Brands That Connect Your Favorite Movies And TV Shows". Fast Company.
  6. ^ May, Tom; Foley, Joe (28 June 2018). "12 of the best fictional brands from film and TV". Creative Bloq.
  7. ^ Sherlock, Ben (22 July 2023). "10 Most Iconic Fictional Brand-Name Products In Movies & TV". ScreenRant.
  8. ^ Angelos, Ayla (6 September 2023). "I'm a fake brand, in a fake world: The secrets behind designing a great fictional brand for TV and film". It's Nice That.
  9. ^ a b Hagey, Keach (July 10, 2015). "'The Simpsons' Duff Beer Tries to Tap Markets Outside Springfield". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved September 8, 2016.
  10. ^ McFarland, Ian G.; Winemiller, John T. (2019). "Fictional Brands, Famous Mark : Recurring Characters, Places, and Elements Can Serve as Source Identifiers for Creative Works". American Bar Association.
  11. ^ a b Daniel, Alex (30 March 2024). "How to create a fictional brand". Financial Times.
  12. ^ a b c Kohlstedt, Kurt (9 April 2018). "Acme to Morley: The Real Stories Behind Famous Fictional Film & TV Brands". 99% Invisible.
  13. ^ E.O. Costello. "ACME". The Warner Brothers Cartoon Companion. Archived from the original on 2011-07-12.
  14. ^ Lince, Tim (July 17, 2015). "Duff Beer launches in response to counterfeits but challenges in Europe remain". World Trademark Review. Globe Business Media Group. Archived from the original on August 9, 2015. Retrieved September 8, 2016.
  15. ^ Fitzpatrick, Alex; Vella, Matt; Eadicicco, Lisa; Peckham, Matt; Pullen, John Patrick; Begley, Sarah; D'Addario, Daniel (June 2, 2016). "The 18 Most Influential Fake Companies of All Time". Time. Archived from the original on June 2, 2016. Retrieved June 7, 2016.
  16. ^ a b Jay Garmon (16 Mar 2009). "Geek Trivia: Search party of the second part". TechRepublic (CBS Interactive). Archived from the original on 2016-02-14. Retrieved 1 Apr 2014. ()
  17. ^ "The Search Engine Equivalent Of The 555 Telephone Numbers Seen In Television And Film Is?". How-To Geek. Archived from the original on 2015-06-23. Retrieved 20 Jul 2015. ()
  18. ^ Seitz, Dan (11 Dec 2009). "5 Things Hollywood Reuses More Than Plots". Cracked (Demand Media). Archived from the original on 2015-08-28. Retrieved 20 Jul 2015. ()
  19. ^ "Best 'fake' brands in film and TV". DigiTitles.com. 2013. Retrieved 1 Apr 2014.
  20. ^ Stacy Conradt (3 Mar 2009). "The Quick 10: 10 Fake Brands Used by the Entertainment Industry". Mental Floss. Retrieved 1 Apr 2014.
  21. ^ Wolf, Mark J.P. (2014). Building Imaginary Worlds: The Theory and History of Subcreation. Routledge. p. 218. ISBN 978-0415631204.
  22. ^ Morley: The cigarette brand that doesn't exist… even though it's in every TV show. Radio Times. January 18, 2017. Retrieved September 29, 2021.
  23. ^ "Hollywood's counterfeit factory". BBC News. 2017-02-23. Retrieved 2018-08-08.
  24. ^ Schafer, Debra Kate (24 October 2020). "Iconic Fictional Brands on 'The Simpsons,' 'The Walking Dead' & More TV Shows". TV Insider.
  25. ^ "How a Chicago company made Gene Wilder's most beloved movie role possible". Chicago Tribune.
  26. ^ Food Industry R&D. Wiley. 25 October 2016. pp. 238–239. ISBN 9781119089407.
  27. ^ "Willy Wonka's everlasting film plot". 11 July 2005.
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