"Where's The Beef?"

It all started with a fairly run of the mill TV commercial for national fast food chain Wendy's....


....that turned three words into the national catch phrase of 1984. And launched a tiny octogenarian lady named Clara Peller into viral superstardom.

This wasn't Clara Peller's only commercial. She starred in a few others prior to the Wendy's ads.


The Wendy's commercial debuted on January 10, 1984 and instantly caught on nationwide. Leading to several sequels to the original Wendy's commercial and a simply massive merchandising blitz.

She also had a small radio hit, which sampled her "Where's The Beef" phrase. Copies of the single were sold at Wendy's.

"Where's The Beef" Coyote McCloud feat. Clara Peller (1984)

The "Where's The Beef" commercials and product tie-ins made millions for Wendy's and brought them out of a deep sales slump. According to Wendy's, Clara Peller made $500,000 from the commercials, a number Clara Peller herself had disputed.

It even became a political comeback when former vice President and Democratic challenger to President Reagan, Walter Mondale used this line against his Democratic primary challenger Gary Hart.


However, the "Where's The Beef" mania didn't last long. (Oversaturation, as you can clearly see here, has a way of doing that.) But Clara Peller thought her Wendy's contract allowed her to do commercials for other products that didn't directly compete with Wendy's, such as Prego spaghetti sauce. Not so. Lawyers for Wendy's insisted "Where's the beef" meant ONLY Wendy's hamburgers and she was released from her contract.

She went on to use variants of the line in movies, TV and other commercials. But with no mention of the word "beef".

Here's a clip from the movie "Moving Violations", where she stars opposite Nedra Volz ("Different Strokes")



Clara Peller died on August 11, 1987, a week after her 85th birthday.

Controla-Tone (1955)

The Controla-Tone was an early do-it-yourself TV remote control, The Controla-Tone was a TV volume controller that worked by the user first removing the back of the TV set and connecting the lead wires of Controla-Tone to the speaker leads. The user could then control the volume output through a small knob on the Controla-Tone unit from his/her easy chair.

It only worked for sound. The Controla-Tone did not power on/off, change channels or adjust picture. It could also work for radio.

Not much else is known about The Controla-Tone Co. of Tacoma, WA other than this is believed to be their only product. It was advertised in the June 1955 issue of Popular Mechanics.

Although initial sales were good, TVs with dedicated remotes that could do far more than control volume were lowering in price and becoming increasingly affordable to the average consumer, making the Controla-Tone pretty much doomed.

1970s Magnavox Drum Console Stereo

These are very rare today, Magnavox Drum Consoles were designed to blend in as an end table as well as match the popular octagon shaped living room furniture of that time.

Chu-Bops

Chu-Bops were awesome.

Chu-Bops came out in 1980. Their first series consisted of eight different then-current album covers by then contemporary artists including Foghat, The Knack, Pat Benatar, Rush, The Spinners and others.

Each Chu-Bops album sleeve had song lyrics and band bios printed on the back of each cover. They also had an order form on the detachable flap for offers (such a protective case to store your Chu-Bops collection) and fan club memberships.

Photo: Stuff We Collect.com

They came in shrink wrap. The gum was your typical pink hard gum seen in most baseball card packs, but in disc shape. Like a tiny vinyl LP (there was no music stamped into them and you couldn't play them on a record player). On the shelf, they looked like tiny vinyl LPs

Later series included an all Beatles set, and Elvis set and several others until the Chu-Bops line was discontinued in 1983.

Tab Flavors of the 1970s

It wasn't ONLY just cola. In the 1970s, Tab had a line of diet soda flavors. (Photos: USA Soda)