List of Pepsi spokespersons

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Pepsi, the carbonated beverage, has had many advertising spokespersons over the years. PepsiCo's other drink brands, including Mountain Dew and Gatorade, also have a variety of famous spokespersons.

[edit] History

Hundreds of celebrities have advertised for Pepsi products, for instance NASCAR driver Jeff Gordon who runs a Pepsi paint scheme at Talladega Superspeedway and Daytona International Speedway. In Europe and the UK celebrities such as footballer David Beckham and pop stars that include Mariah Carey, Britney Spears, Jennifer Lopez, Janet Jackson, The Corrs, Five, the Spice Girls, S Club 7, Gary Glitter, Beyoncé, Pink and most recently Christina Aguilera, have all been featured in campaigns for the drink. Other spokespersons have included Halle Berry, Jackie Chan, Diddy, and Cindy Crawford, Fred Savage, and Jimmy Fallon. The most famous may be little Hallie Kate Eisenberg who started making commercials at age five.

For the 1988 and 1989 seasons, Pepsi were the title sponsor of Suzuki's effort in motorcycle road racing's premier class, Grand Prix 500cc. The Pepsi livery was a fresh addition to grand prix motorcycling, and a welcome change from traditional tobacco backers. During this period, Suzuki also produced a number of road going replicas of the GP bikes, emblazoned with the same Pepsi signage as the works bikes. Due to the livery's association with one of Suzuki's most popular riders, the flamboyant Texan, Kevin Schwantz, riders today are still producing their own replicas as tribute.

In Latin America, Colombian artists Shakira, Juanes, and Puerto Rican Daddy Yankee have successfully promoted the soft drink. As for Asia, celebrity and singers Jay Chou, Aaron Kwok, Jolin Tsai, Rain, Louis Koo, Nicholas Tse, F4, Faye Wong, and Kelly Chan have appeared in several different advertisements. In India, Pepsi first used Aamir Khan, model turned actress Mahima Chaudhary and model and ex-Miss World Aishwariya Rai to promote its product. Later it used celebrities like Amitabh Bachchan, Shah Rukh Khan, Kajol,Rani Mukherjee, Saif Ali Khan, Fardeen Khan, Akshay Kumar , Shahid Kapur (before he entered the movie world), Preity Zinta,John Abraham, Priyanka Chopra, and Kareena Kapoor as well as the national cricket team. In Australia, the trend has been to use local Australian celebrities to promote Pepsi including Kylie Minogue, Jennifer Hawkins (Miss Universe 2005), Holly Valance, Harry Kewell, Sonny Bill Williams, Delta Goodrem, Mark Philippoussis and several others.

In addition, Joan Crawford was married to PepsiCo president Alfred Steele, and was advertising executive and board of directors member for several years. Singer-songwriter Michael Jackson boosted the sales of Pepsi in the 1980s when he became spokesperson for the company. He was infamously burned during the filming of a Pepsi commercial in 1984.

During the 1960s, Joanie Sommers sang two popular commercial songs ("It's Pepsi, for those who think young" and "Now you see it, now you don't, oh, Diet Pepsi") for Pepsi-Cola that were run in commercials and for which she came to be often referred to as The Pepsi Girl.

In the early 1990s, Ray Charles was the star of a Diet Pepsi campaign called "You Got the Right One, Baby," which was also known as "Uh-huh." In 1992, "Gotta Have it!" became a regular slogan for Pepsi, with celebrities such as Regis Philbin and John Tesh appearing on the same commercials simultaniously.

Recently, Pepsi got a new spokesperson, the pop artist Christina Aguilera, a former spokesperson of Pepsi's rival Coca-Cola. PepsiCo said in a recent interview that Christina Aguilera has that 'dare for more' approach. Aretha Franklin was also a spokesperson in 1998. And also in 1999 Janet Jackson signed on to the original "Ask For More" campaign which featured a song of the same name written and sung by Jackson.

In 1997, the soft drink featured the Spice Girls' songs "Step To Me" and "Move Over" as part of their new-generation image.

In 1999, Britney Spears became a spokesperson for Pepsi, and produced some of the most well-known Pepsi ads to date. Filmed in a Spears-like music video style, the television spots were extremely popular among the "MTV" crowd, and became staples in pop culture. PepsiCo is rumored to have paid Britney Spears in excess of $80m for her promotional run with the Pepsi brand. Spears' contract concluded with an advertisement with P!nk, Beyoncé and Enrique. All the stars reportedly received salaries of over two million dollars for the promotion.^{[citation needed]} Beyonce was dropped, in 2004, when Pepsi announced that they felt celebrity names were overpowering the brand, but the break from celebrities was short lived, with Diddy being one of the brands current big name staples.^{[citation needed]}

In 2005, Christina Aguilera was signed to promote the popular drink (she was previously promoting Coca-Cola in 2000). The campaign featuring Aguilera was released in 2006, but not in the United States. Some commercials featured singer Elissa, and some with Aguilera by herself.

More recently, PepsiCo has launched the "Cool Tones" campaign. It involves Mariah Carey, Mary J Blige and The All American Rejects writing and performing ringtones that can be won by purchasing a Pepsi bottle. Carey also recorded a commercial for the campaign in which she performs one of her original ringtones. Carey, who wrote and produced 20 songs for the campaign, is said to have been paid $4 million by Pepsi to promote the campaign.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Troubled endorsers

Pepsi has had a notorious association with spokespersons, primarily popstars, over the last 25 years. The first international popstar to become a spokesperson for the drink was Michael Jackson, who along with his brothers (The Jackson 5) advertised Pepsi for "the new generation" in an advertisement featuring a reworking of his song "Billie Jean". However, when filming a second advertisement in 1984, a pyrotechnics stunt went wrong and badly burnt Jackson. Although he continued to be associated with the drink, the company dropped him, in 1993, after charges of child molestation were brought forward.^{[citation needed]}

In 1987, David Bowie and Tina Turner joined forces to advertise the soft drink, in an advertisement featuring a reworking of Bowie's hit "Modern Love." The company also agreed to sponsor Bowie's 1987 Glass Spider World Tour. Bowie was accused of sexual assault shortly afterwards, and the company dropped the advertisements immediately. A year later Pepsi's attempts to make Madonna a new Pepsi spokesperson ended with the infamous "Like a Prayer" incident when Madonna's video brought charges of anti-Catholicism to the company. Pepsi promptly dropped her, although she kept her five million dollars for the ads.^{[citation needed]}

According to allhiphop.com, in 2005, a rumor spread that the newest spokesperson for Pepsi, Kanye West, was dropped after a comment made against President George W. Bush. Nicole Bradley, public relations manager of Pepsi, clarified that the company's relationship with West had not changed and their marketing will continue as planned.