It was not the Salad Days but the Sainsbury’s days and the peak of the supermarket’s glory. After pioneering retail concepts like own-brand products and out-of-town superstores, Sainsbury’s had firmly established itself as the food lover’s supermarket.
The retailer also pioneered a new kind of advertising for supermarkets. Rather than focus on selling a wide range of products, Sainsbury’s award-winning advertising, “Everybody’s favourite ingredient” used celebrities to show how each product could be part of a recipe.
It was also the year that Renault Clio introduced us to Nicole and Papa, an enduring advertising partnership that lasted for seven years. Haagen-Dazs proved that sex sells with an award-winning press campaign that grew annual sales by 398% and altered the UK ice-cream market with its premium positioning. Stella Artois was reassuringly entertaining with an ad campaign inspired by Jean de Florette.
Kids were obsessed with Sonic the Hedgehog, a blue hedgehog who became a cult character driving sales of the Sega Megadrive console. Then there was the short-lived success of The Sega GameGear, the poor relation of Nintendo’s Gameboy and Sega MegaDrive. Not to mention Noel House Party’s My Blobby, a huge pink and yellow spotted blob who made it to Number One.