When you hear the name “Product 19”….you’ll either flash on an experimental invention from some corporate R&D department….or, if you’re one of its fans…. you might think of the health cereal….which was rare in the aisles of American supermarkets….yet loved all the same. Most people these days seemed to barely know of its existence….but Product 19 cereal died a slow, oatsy, fade to black….while leaving devoted fans desperate when it was no longer on the shelves after 2017.
For nearly 50 years….Product 19 cereal was simply an answer to a business problem when it was first released in 1967 as Kellogg’s answer to General Mills’ Total…..which had hit the market six years prior. As the current slogan still contends….Total aimed to provide 100% of the daily amounts of nutrients like vitamin E, calcium, iron, and more….so Kellogg’s needed something to compete with this new healthy blockbuster….so they began attempting to develop a vitamin cereal of their own…and eventually settling on Product 19….as the name was a bit curious at first….and its origins remain apocryphal….for according to one story….it was so named because the end product was the 19th iteration of the cereal they were developing….while others say it was simply the 19th product Kellogg’s developed that year. Either way, Product 19 stuck, a workmanlike name that echoed what the cereal promised to do: provide a base of nutrition, nothing more or less.
When it comes to television reception….how many people can really remember tv antennas….or for that matter….it’s predecessor rabbit-ears television antennas….cuz if you remember rabbit ears tv antennas…take it from this lil ole chiweenie Sportsphile….YOU ARE AN OLD DOG….cuz as the 1970’s turned into the 1980’s….the television antennas were in the process of became yesterday’s technology….while the satellite dish found a way to get small enough to fit on a rooftop….and it become the norm at every household in America by the turn of the century. Radio Shack was a leader in the sales of television antennas….plus they were very good at marketing.
