->Here it is shown how the leprechauns are first flayed and then pulped to be turned into the marshmallows. Off to the side are waist-high piles of abandoned little green hats that will be shipped back to Ireland under international treaty.\\
"Am I the only one who finds this a little bit creepy?" I ask aloud. Elayne ignores me.\\
"You can have your picture taken and put on a box of Wheaties," she says.\\
"That's insane," I say. "I can't masturbate to a picture of myself. Where are the Mary Lou Retton boxes?"\\
--''TheAreasOfMyExpertise'', by "the PC".

A character, animal or animate object (see EverythingTalks) which theoretically represents all that is good and attractive about a product, and which may act as a spokesman for it. Sometimes it may be an anthropomorphized version of the product itself, or of some primary component in it.

Mascots were almost mandatory in the early days of advertising on radio and television, but are [[DiscreditedTrope far less common today,]] probably because of the growing sophistication of the audience coupled with the perception that they are, really, rather silly. Outside of advertising aimed at children and/or breakfast foods, a {{Mascot}} in a modern commercial is as likely to be [[SubvertedTrope a subversion]] as not.

An exception would be Japan, where everything has a cute mascot nowadays. EVERYTHING.
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'''Examples:'''
* One of the most famous and longest-lived is Miss Chiquita Banana, for Chiquita Brands Intl. Based loosely on Carmen Miranda, she dates back to 1945.
** The famous [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RFDOI24RRAEoriginal advertisement]] starring this mascot could also arguably go under trope LetsMeetTheMeat
* Mister Clean for the cleaner of the same name. Bonus points if you can identify the piece of jewelry he wears and where on his body: The answer [[spoiler:he wears an earring on his right ear]].
* Morris the Cat for 9 Lives cat food.
* The Energizer Bunny.
** Or his cousin in the UK, who works for Duracell.
* Mrs. Butterworth, formerly a borderline racist Southern Mammy, is now always presented as an animated humanoid syrup bottle.
** Parodied on ''CloneHigh'' with Racist Mammy Products.
* Buster Brown shoes had the early 20th century comic strip character Buster Brown and his dog Tige.
* Elsie the Cow for Borden. (And Elmer the Bull, the mascot of Elmer's Glue, which is manufactured by a different part of the same conglomerate.)
* Charlie the Tuna for Starkist.
* Possibly the earliest subverted mascot would be Big Fig for Nabisco's Fig Newton cookies in the 1970s.
* Similarly, the four guys dressed as the fruit from the Fruit of the Loom logo.
* Aunt Jemima, back in the early 20th century, was an African-American slave with a kerchief on her head. After the Black Rights movement in the 1960s, she was transformed into a middle-class African-American housewife.
** But Uncle Ben, on the rice packages, still looks pretty much the way he did at the beginning. So does Rastus, the waiter on the Cream of Wheat box.
* The Scrubbing Bubbles, for Scrubbing Bubbles bathroom cleaner (originally named Dow Bathroom Cleaner).
* Colonel Sanders, for Kentucky Fried Chicken. Mind you, Harland Sanders was a real person, the founder of KFC (though he was never actually a colonel, having received it as an honorary title for his achievements as a restaurateur and kept it as a means of self-promotion), and at times attained quasi-heroic status in Kentucky. Opinions on his animated, wise-cracking, dancing doppleganger are mixed.
* TV Example: Buster from MythBusters.
* Apple's new "I'm a Mac/I'm a PC" ads feature Justin Long and John Hodgman representing the two computers. Their effectiveness is questionable; viewers across OS lines have fallen in love with the idea (even to the point of {{Shipping}} the two characters), but among those who don't adore it the general consensus seems to be that the "Mac" character is vastly less appealing than his "out of date" rival. Not to mention that Mac is never invited to a LAN party...
* The Apple adverts in Britain featured David Mitchell and Robert Webb as the PC and the Mac respectively. They have been quite unpopular, and have raised questions about the duo's credibilty.
**Not least because, like the US adverts, while Webb is the ostentatiously cool character, Mitchell generally comes across as the more down-to-earth and likeable (this is despite him often playing the role of an unapologetic quasi-intellectual).
* Companies like General Mills and Kellogg's tend to have a mascot for each of their brands of breakfast cereals. A few examples:
** The Trix Rabbit, who had to put up with almost 40 years of punk kids denying him Trix Cereal
** Tony the Tiger for Frosted Flakes.
** Coco the Monkey for Cocoa Crispies. (Has become an outreach of the Rice Krispies franchise, so its mascot(s) have become...)
** Snap, Crackle, and Pop for Rice Krispies.
** Lucky the Leprechaun for Lucky Charms.
** Sonny the Cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs.
** Toucan Sam for Froot Loops.
** Buzzbee the Honeynut Cheerios Bee.
** Cap'n Crunch for the cereal of the same name.
** Loopy the Bee for Honey Loops.
** Officer Crumb, the Cookie Crook and Chip for Cookie Crisps. (Only Chip is still around, and he's changed from a dog into a ''wolf'')
*** There was also Jarvis the Wizard who got replaced by Cookie Crook & Officer Crumb, and Jarvis even had one commercial ''alongside'' Cookie Crook so there is a linear progression from Jarvis to Cookie Crook & Officer Crumb to Chip the Dog to Chip the Wolf. That said Cookie Crisp seems to BrotherChuck their mascots on a regular basis.
** Bob, Qiuenno and Wendell for Cinnamon Toast Crunch. (Only Wendell is still around)
** The competitive Apple and Cinnamon Stick for Apple Jacks.
** Fred and Barney from ''TheFlintstones'' for Fruity and Cocoa Pebbles. (Also, Snagglepuss was the Cocoa Crispies mascot at one time.)
** And who can ever forget Count Chocula, Frankenberry, Fruit Brute et al. from their namesake cereals?
** All of these characters have been given their own webcomic, ''[[http://www.webcomicsnation.com/poyorick/botg/series.php?view=archive&chapter=10960 Breakfast of the Gods]].'' Be warned: it's pretty violent.
*** The knock-off brand Malt-o-Meal has the kangaroos Blue and Lil' Oaty.
** The slightly terrifying Hunger used to be the mascot for shreddies, on the basis that it "kept hunger locked up...till lunch". Nowadays they use a group of old ladies who are knitting the cereal.
* Slightly creepily, Felix (cat) for Felix (cat food). Slogan: "Cats like Felix... like Felix."
* The creepy, silent King from Burger King, who shows up in the most random places (like your bed) to give people BK food. (Actually a [[SubvertedTrope subversion]] of an earlier version of the King, who was played straight as a cheerful kids' mascot a la Ronald [=McDonald=])
* Most video game companies use a character from one of their franchises as a mascot; Nintendo has {{Mario}}, SEGA has SonicTheHedgehog, Capcom has MegaMan, SNK has Terry Bogard, etc.
** In Japan, Sega actually had a second mascot specifically for the Saturn: Segata Sanshiro, a BadAss martial artist who would beat up people for not playing the Saturn. He eventually got his own video game, which was the last first-party game released for the Saturn.
*** Capcom and Sega's former mascots include '''Cap'''tain '''Com'''mando and Alex Kidd, respectively. [[StreetFighter Ryu]] can also be considered a mascot for Capcom due to being quite recognizable and appearing in almost all of their crossover games (he also predates Mega Man by a few months).
** {{Atlus}} uses Jack Frost and his brothers from ShinMegamiTensei
* GEICO Insurance has two mascots, their British gecko and a bunch of pissed off Neanderthals who didn't like the slogan, "So easy, even a caveman do it!"
** The writers of the ads attempted to create a sitcom from those Neanderthals. Thankfully, it bombed.
*** Especially thankful is Geico, which could not run ads with the characters during the series' run.
** Kash, the pile of money with googly eyes and his own theme song has also been slowly adapted into a third(!) mascot for Geico.
* Applebee's had a talking apple voiced by Wanda Sykes Hall. The character was discontinued after new owners took over.
* Probably before anyone's time here, Alka-Seltzer was represented by a walking, talking antacid (in black and white, no less) named "Speedy Alka-Seltzer." (The voice was reminiscent of Beany in the ''Beany and Cecil'' cartoons from the 1940s & 1950s.) An author on the subject of commercials, in a book called "Down the Tube" noted that Speedy was so gay, that the new ad company who got rid of him did it so fast it must have been because he was caught soliciting a cop in a bus station mens' room.
* A few musical groups have mascots, the best example is probably IronMaiden's undead EvilAlbino "Eddie".
** [[{{Motorhead}} Motörhead]] has Snaggletooth the War-pig.
** {{Megadeth}} has [[DemBones Vic Rattlehead]].
** Not man of {{Anthrax}}.
** Face Bones of [[{{Metalocalypse}} Dethklok]].
** {{Disturbed}}'s The Guy.
** GammaRay has Fangface.
** Jack O. Lantern from {{Helloween}}.
** Set Abominae, main character of IcedEarth's ''Something Wicked Saga''.
** Captain Adrian of RunningWild (a [[OurWerewolvesAreDifferent werewolf]] {{Pirate}} [[NinjaPirateZombieRobot thing]]).
* Fast food chain Jack in the Box has Jack, a man with a clown-head who is both mascot and {{Kayfabe}} CEO of the company. Like the King, Jack is a subversion of an earlier mascot, a clown-head which stood atop the original Jack in the Box restaurant and which appeared on their drive-thru menus for many years. The ad campaign featuring Jack has run continuously since 1995, making it one of the longest-running in history.
* Three words: Kool-Aid Man. ''Ooohhh yeeeeeaaaaaahh!''
* "AFLAC!"
* Flo the checkout girl in the Progressive Insurance commercials.
* The San Diego Chicken was originally a mascot for a local radio station. He single handedly created the profession of sports mascots. He is now the patron saint of all sports mascots.
** How about the Army mule and the Navy goat? Don't those sports mascots date back at least 100 years? I think other college teams had mascots as well. Yale bulldog perhaps? And how could I forget Bucky Badger?
*** Yes, that is correct; college mascots are far older. ''Pro teams'' with mascots, however, were more or less unheard of until the Famous Chicken (as he's now known, presumably because he's no longer tied to San Diego and has become a freelance mascot...I think he appeared in a ''Gymboree'' tape I had as a toddler) came about.
* Erin Esurance hawking Esurance. Supposely, [[RuleThirtyFour there's fanporn with this character,]] OrSoIHeard.
** Pfft, whatever. Much more important was the [[ProductPlacement guest appearance]] on WhoWantsToBeASuperhero!
* Round Table, a pizza place, has a knight in full-body armour, complete with pointy face-guard.
* There was a brand of cat food called "Kattomeat" and they started advertising it with a white tomcat called "Arthur"...became such a good mascot that not many months later they had to rename the catfood "Arthur's".
* Fictional example: the wavy-haired boy in the vault-dweller jumpsuit who serves as the smiling figurehead for Vault-Tec in ''{{Fallout}}''. Fans call him "Vault Boy" or "Fallout Boy" (no relation to the band or TheSimpsons), and he's come to serve as a mascot for the game series, as well.
* Ronald [=McDonald=] has gone pretty much un-subverted to this day thanks to becoming part of the greater American pop-cultural landscape.
** Save for a brief period in the mid-90s where he was depicted engaging in such activities as clubbing and playing golf as part of the ad campaign for the execrable "Arch Deluxe" burger (a "sandwich for 'adults.'")
* The Companion Cube for {{Portal}}.
* Weight Watchers has Hungry, an orange furry little monster that constantly tempts you to eat junk food and thus ruin your diet.
** Anticipating Weight Watchers' hungry little monster, Sultana biscuits gave us [[RidiculouslyCuteCritter Mr Yummy]], [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=97kNwRArK60 a brightly chequered muppet]] originally meant to [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ftmZD_r_sQ8 personify the munchies]]. 2008 saw the manufacture of a limited number of Mr Yummy handpuppets, which sold out within weeks.
* [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Little Caesars.]]
* The Chik-fil-A cows, exhorting people to "Eet Mor Chikin".
* How come [[WaltDisney Mickey Mouse]] and [[LooneyTunes Bugs Bunny]] weren't mentioned yet?
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