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When asked what goes into a creating an iconic ad, he says it’s not much different than the ingredients of winning a championship. While he thought the spot was great and witnessed it become a pop culture staple, he couldn’t have predicted it would still be discussed nearly three decades later. Now retired in Phoenix, Pitzel had fond memories of working on that project-his kids appear in the commercial and played one-on-one with Jordan during takes.
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If we’d just done it with the ‘Jungle Book’ music, it would have been a cute little spot, but it never would have resonated like it did.” “As it turned out, it was way better that I wrote the song because that’s what people remember. “I heard that instrumental opening that I’m like, ‘Oh, my God. He settled on a melody the next day with the music and singing all performed by session singers. He jotted down the lyrics for the jingle on a paper tablecloth, and then faxed a few music production houses while still at the restaurant. With the season scheduled to start soon and the agency unsure of the next move, Pitzel went to a favorite restaurant where he frequently brainstormed. Pitzel thought it was lackluster and too similar to Jordan’s early Nike commercials.īut he became inspired as his children watched Disney’s 1967 film “The Jungle Book.” After changing a few lines of the song “I Wanna Be Like You” and presenting a mock-up, all parties settled on his idea.Īfter filming visuals for the commercial, there was one last hurdle to cross: convincing Disney to allow them to use the “Jungle Book” music Pitzel said they wanted too much money to approve it (a rep for Disney said they could not confirm Pitzel’s account as it was decades ago). In 1992, Pitzel was working for Chicago-based ad agency Bayer Bess Vanderwarker and tasked with overseeing a spot for Jordan that they had already created. And they go, ‘Well, I think you did it’.” “Everybody knows I’ve been saying that for years. “My whole goal in advertising, I told my wife right when I got into it, was I just wanted to create a little sliver of pop culture somewhere along the line,” said Bernie Pitzel, the advertising executive who created the song. While it’s showcased Jordan’s dominance between baselines, it’s also shed light on his worldwide marketing allure.Īlthough the Hall-of-Famer starred in many memorable commercials throughout the 1990s for major brands such McDonald’s “Nothing But Net” spot and Nike’s “Failure” ad, one of his most famous may be Gatorade’s “Be Like Mike” commercial.īut if it weren’t inadvertently for the Walt Disney corporation, the melodic jingle would’ve never been made. With that being said, the rest of this set is very solid and it should quench the thirst that Jordan fans, Gatorade fans, and fans of any other athletic apparel brand have for stylish gear and high-end shoes.The Last Dance, ESPN’s docuseries detailing the 1998 and final season of the Chicago Bulls championship dynasty, has served as a reminder to basketball fans of the greatness of Michael Jordan on the court.
The Gatorade-inspired "Mike" logo on its own is a clever bit of logo design and if that alone was the only part of the brand that we got to see, then I would have been excited just for that alone. Granted, it would be difficult for any Air Jordan shoe to not sell well, but the rest of the gear looks good enough to indicate to me that this should be a hot seller with the holidays right around the corner. It sure looks like the Jordan Brand has come up with another solid idea that should be a hot seller. This year they've once again dipped their fingers into the nostalgia well and the water of days gone by came up in the hue of yellow that fills up an old glass bottle of Gatorade.
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As Gatorade head of sports marketing Jeff Kearney noted in his conversation with Rovell, Air Jordan had a hit on their hands last year when they came out with gear related to the Space Jam movie.