Newtons (cookie) - Advertising

Advertising

In the 1939 animated Mickey Mouse short "Mickey's Surprise Party", Mickey gives Minnie many Nabisco products, one of which is Fig Newtons. Mickey claims that they are his favorite.

In the 1950s, for Saturday morning television, advertisements featured a cowboy singing, "Yer darn tootin', I like Fig Newtons."

In the 1961 version of the film The Parent Trap, Susan offers Fig Newtons to her sister while they are locked up together in the cabin.

In the 1970s, Nabisco ran an advertising campaign for the Fig Newton. The commercials featured actor James (Jimmy) Harder dressed like a fig. At the conclusion of the song, he struck the "Fig Newton Pose", leaning forward and balancing on his left foot, with arms spread and right leg raised behind him. In "Christmas Eve on Sesame Street", Cookie Monster says the name of this brand before he eats the whole typewriter.

When Grape Newtons were introduced in the wake of Cherry, Blueberry, and Apple (which came several years earlier), a chimpanzee appeared on the commercial, and the song "Yes, We Have No Bananas" played to the chimp's consternation.

American advertisements have most frequently featured a narrator with a British accent and other European themes, presenting the pastry as an elegant, sophisticated "adult" sweet that would appeal to the upper classes, rather than as a kiddie lunchbox snack. In the 1980s, Nabisco again produced the popular advertising slogan "A cookie is just a cookie, but a Newton is fruit and cake."

In 2006, the brand's push was centered on the claim that a Fig Newton contained more fruit than a Nutri-Grain bar.

In 2007, Nabisco used the slogan "The cookie that thinks it's a fruit" to advertise Fig Newtons. The packaging of Newtons describes the product as "Fruit Chewy Cookies".

$14.8 million was spent advertising Newtons in 2011. Advertisements are generally based on nostalgia and directed to baby boomers rather than children.