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{{trope}}
[[File:danvs_genericos_4894danvs genericos 4894.jpg|link=Dan Vs.|right]]
{{quote|''Here we have a can of the world's most popular cola -- no names, no lawsuits.''|'''Richard Hammond''' in ''[[Brainiac: Science Abuse]]''.}}
 
When a script calls for a consumer product, and no one has offered the producers a [[Product Placement]] deal, a television program must resort to making up a brand -- orbrand—or, in some cases, [[Pixellation|obscuring a real brand]] so that it can't be identified. Another technique is to make a lookalike label that doesn't show the actual brand name -- forname—for instance, a bright-red soft drink can inscribed, in white letters, "Cola".
 
Under Canadian broadcast regulations, product placement is considered a form of payola and is strictly forbidden. To prevent even the appearance of product placeent, real brand names can't be shown on locally-produced TV shows. Dramas, comedies, and even cooking and home improvement shows have to block out the brand names of the items they use or replace them with Brand X (TV sports and news/current affairs programs are exempt, the first because the advertising can't be controlled and the second because news programs may have to report a story specifically about a product, and also because they can do whatever they damn well want). These rules don't affect imported content, though.
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Sometimes fictional products can become story elements in and of themselves, either as part of the "world background" of a show, or as [[Running Gag|running gags]].
 
[[Film|Films]]s with blatant product placements, such as the remake of ''[[The Thomas Crown Affair]]'', usually have them obscured when they are syndicated.
 
In addition to Brand X, some movie and TV producers may choose to use discontinued products as a point of style. [[Quentin Tarantino]] is known for using boxes of discontinued cereal in his movies, such as "Fruit Brute". Wes Anderson used a discontinued brand of European cigarettes in ''[[The Royal Tenenbaums]]''.
 
At one time this was a universal practice in advertising, allowing a marketer to [[Side by Side Demonstration|compare his product to a competitor]] without actually ''naming'' the competitor and reminding the viewer of why he might prefer it. The competitor would often be referred to as "the leading brand", giving rise to the question, "if your product is so good, why is the other brand leading?" In the last two decades, advertising has gotten bolder, and it is more common to see a real competing product in an ad than not -- ornot—or at least a minimally veiled reference to a competing product (ie, a detergent box with the basic design and color scheme of Tide, but no logo). The practice of ''explicitly naming'' the competition was arguably begun by the great McDonald's/Burger King ad wars of the late '70s and early '80s (specifically, in a Burger King commercial starring a then-four-year-old [[Buffy the Vampire Slayer|Sarah Michelle Gellar]]). There was also the [[Pepsi Challenge]] where Pepsi ran ads showing in blind taste tests, people preferred Pepsi over Coke.
 
However, in some cases it may be mandatory. For example, in Germany it used to be against the law to compare your product to a competitor's product when it was identifiable. Even now, the "laws against unfair competition" allow only verifiable objective comparisons without diminishing the competitor, legally regulated to a point where advertisers rather take a pass on comparisons than risk exposing themselves to lawsuits.
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** Although they look somewhat different from the iMac, the Navis in ''[[Serial Experiments Lain]]'' are made by Tachibana General Labs (Tachibana translates to Mandarin Orange). Of course, there are also some non-disguised references to Apple computers, such as a (small) picture of an iMac with an Apple advertising slogan.
*** Incidentally, Lain's Navi ''is'' based on a Mac, albeit an even older one than the iMac: namely, the [[wikipedia:Twentieth Anniversary Macintosh|Twentieth Anniversary Macintosh]].
** In ''[[Digimon Adventure]]'', the brand of laptop Koushiro used was never named, but it looked like an iBook and had a pineapple symbol on it; this led to it [[Fan Nickname|being nicknamed]] the "PiBook" in fandom. Averted in the [[Short Anime Movie|Short Anime Movies]]s, which all use real computers running a Windows 95 variant and are accurately branded as such.
** A similar laptop shows up in ''[[Ouran High School Host Club]]'', right down to the glowing pineapple logo.
** The newspaper comic ''[[FoxTrot]]'' does this with the "iFruit" brand, whose computers were originally ''shaped like the fruits they're named after''. At one point, Andy attempts to collect them as she would collect * ahem* "Bitty Babies".
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* Fictional fast-food brand "Amigo Tacos" is used as a throwaway name in an early episode of the anime ''[[El Cazador de la Bruja]]''. The name is brought back several times in later episodes, gaining a logo, official waitress uniform and annoying commercial jingle. Eventually an entire episode is set in an "Amigo Tacos" restaurant.
* ''[[Seto no Hanayome]]'' featured "Ningyonet Explorer", the mermaid web browser.
* ''[[Azumanga Daioh]]'' has Adidas gear -- ohgear—oh wait, that's ''Abidas''. My mistake.
* ''[[Ouran High School Host Club]]'' introduced the world to Hescafé brand instant coffee and Mational light bulbs.
* In the ''[[Pet Shop of Horrors]]'' anime there's an audition for a movie by Raramount Pictures.
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'''Daughter:''' "A famous brand of Swedish furnitures"? Are you calling it like that because you can't say any names?
'''Father:''' Of course not! Everyone speaks like that. Now, let me have a glass of this cola drink... }}
* ''[[Johnny the Homicidal Maniac]]'' is full of these -- Jhonenthese—Jhonen Vasquez seems to be fond of this trope, as it appears in ''[[Invader Zim]]'' as well. Taco Hell, the 24/7 with its Brain Freezies, the list goes on.
* Sam & Max's world is filled with bizarre products, especially in the storyline set in a grocery store. About the only recurring brand, though, is a mediocre generic beer called "Cheap, Foul-Smelling Beer".
 
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== Film ==
* [[The View Askewniverse]] has "Nails" cigarettes, "Chewlies" gum, and the entire Mooby corporate empire.
* [[Quentin Tarantino]] includes not only discontinued products, but [[Brand X]] references in all his films (most notably "Red Apple" cigarettes and "Big Kahuna" burgers) as a way of implying that they all take place in the same [[The Verse|Verse]]. Or he's just too lazy to invent more of them.
* Parodied in ''Coming to America'': Cleo's restaurant "McDowell's" seems like one of these, but it turns out that McDonald's ''also'' exists in the movie's universe, and they're desperately trying to build a case against him.
* In ''[[Repo Man]]'', every single consumer good is in plain white packaging with the name of the item on the front -- "Beer", "Potato Chips", etc. Bear in mind, however, that this film was made in the blessedly short heyday of "generic" products; witness the protagonist opening a can of "FOOD" -- not—not necessarily "HUMAN FOOD", even. (These jokes ''are'' still funny, but in places like the UK they're even funnier, since generic brands are still extremely common -- evercommon—ever been to Tesco?) As a counterexample, three supporting characters in the film are named or nicknamed after real-world brands of beer.
** The Tesco comment above is in regards to "store brand" products, which are quite common in the States and do indeed declare their literal contents in large print (with the logo of the store or affiliated brand much smaller).
*** As illustrated on [[wikipedia:Generic brand|The Other Wiki]], generic products of the 1980's were remarkably plain. No logos, no pictures, just a plain white label with block letters; ''[[Repo Man]]'' simply took this a step further. As noted above, such products are uncommon in the States these days, having largely been ''replaced'' by store brands. Though not nationally advertised, store brands receive at least a little marketing attention, in the form of product design and occasional mention in the store's advertisements.
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* In [[Stephen King]]'s ''[[The Dark Tower]]'' series, Roland and his companions from Earth find themselves from time to time in parallel versions of Earth distinguishable only by the fact that the popular brand names of consumer products are different (Nozz-a-La Cola, Shinnaro cameras, Takuro automobiles, etc.)
** Consistently mentioned in a few of his other works (''The Stand'' and ''Kingdom Hospital'', for example) for the sake of [[The Verse]].
* In ''The Kraken Wakes'' by [[John Wyndham]], the main character works for the ''E''BC (English Broadcasting Company). It gets extensively [[Lampshade Hanging|lampshaded]] -- a—a [[Running Gag]] is that every character is introduced saying "don't you mean ''B''BC?", and later gets subverted, when the government takes over the media and the narrator explicitly mentions that the EBC and BBC are now one and the same.
* In Orwell's ''How the Poor Die'', he names the hospital at which he was treated "Hôpital X." According to [[The Other Wiki]], the Hospital was "the Hôpital Cochin."
** Likewise in his book "Down and Out in Paris and London", Orwell worked as a dishwasher at the "Hôtel X." This was the Hôtel de Crillon.
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'''Narrator:''' When you add donkey to rooster you get a violent reaction. }}
*** [[Double Entendre|"Donkey and rooster"? "Violent reaction"?]]
** One specific example involves Adam holding up two bottles of chemicals for the camera, with -- ofwith—of course -- [[Pixelation|blurred labels]].
{{quote|'''Adam:''' This ingredient is made of blur. And this has some blur in it too. Blur is very dangerous. You don't want to mix blur with blur.}}
*** In the above examples the chemicals being mixed tend to be components of explosives. Besides being particularly [[Don't Try This At Home|dangerous to try at home]] there are probably federal and local laws governing/forbidding their use and procurement without licences.
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** For the first several seasons, the manufacturer logos on the regular M5 Industries fleet vehicles were unobscured. The big GMC box truck even had a former owner's company name plainly visible (the vinyl letter decals had been removed, the sticky residue hadn't and was gray with grime. Must've driven Jamie up the wall.)
** What about the Home Depot orange buckets used in multiple episodes? Sure the logos might be out of focus, but anyone who has seen one of those buckets in a store will recognize them immediately.
* The kids' magazine programme ''[[Blue Peter]]'' used to have a craft feature which usually required cereal boxes, empty drinks bottles and so forth... all with the names obscured, because the BBC, being publicly funded, didn't allow any commercial product placement. Sometimes it was patently obvious what the obscured brand was -- onlywas—only the lettering would be blanked out on a cornflake box, leaving the Kelloggs' rooster visible. Famously, most projects included "sticky tape", known to everyone else as Sellotape or [[Scotch Tape]], and "sticky-backed plastic" (known to everyone else as ''Fablon''. "Sticky tape" is now called Sellotape, though, now the producers have realised that the name was well and truly [[wikipedia:Genericised trademark|genericised]]. "Sticky-backed plastic", however, stuck so deep in the public psyche that now it's used as the name for the stuff instead of the brand.
* Another instance of the BBC not allowing product placement was duly mocked in an episode of ''[[Top Gear]]'', where the three presenters (and The Stig) participate in a 24-hour endurance race in their modified BMW. As a final touch, they wanted to put product placements all over their car, but BBC regulations prevented them from doing so -- soso—so they made up their own, including such products as Peniston Oil and Larsen Biscuits (which appears as "Penis" and "Arse Biscuits" when the door is open).
* The BBC's policy was mercilessly spoofed on at least one episode of [[Have I Got News for You]]:
{{quote|'''Jeremy Clarkson:''' It makes Irish stout taste like a chocolate milkshake.
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** Alton Brown on ''[[Good Eats]]'' also used "That drink powder" in an episode about pickles. He had a guy in a red glass burst through a wall in order to "tell" us what it was. Alton then remarked "Aren't you supposed to be a pitcher?"
*** Alton Brown is also a big fan of Brand X and "Greeking" (as the process is more formally called). In a "behind the scenes" episode of ''[[Good Eats]]'' he explains the process behind "Greeking." That said, it's always obvious what grocery store he's shopping at (either Kroger, Publix, or Harry's/Whole Foods, depending on how old the episode is), and episodes before season 5 don't bother with the greeking.
**** [[Cooking Show|Cooking Shows]]s in general do this somewhat frequently -- [[Rachael Ray]] even went so far as to have completely redesigned packaging (presumably with in-jokes known only to the staff) for numerous seasons of ''30 Minute Meals''. Averted, however, by Giada De Laurentiis, who is a ''very'' big fan of Trader Joe's products.
*** Likewise, ''Food Network Challenge'' frequently has challengers working with "puffed cereal treats". Rice Krispies didn't even jump on the bandwagon when they broke a world record sculpting with the stuff.
* Notably subverted in ''[[Freaks and Geeks]]'' when characters were shown drinking "Faygo" brand cola, which really exists but is hard to find outside the upper Midwest.
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** ''Chuck'' also debadges non-Toyota cars.
* Cans of soda on ''[[The Big Bang Theory]]'' are clearly designed to mimic real brands, but with HD one can clearly see that they are drinking "Diet Cola" (styled like the Diet Coke logo), "Z-un" (styled like the 7-Up logo), and a brand with literally no name but a perfect copy of Sprite's interlocking-fruits symbol.
* The BBC's policy is actually quite inconsistent. For every instance of a [[Brand X]] there's a passing reference to an actual product, often an alcoholic beverage, that's too fleeting to qualify as [[Product Placement]].
* ''[[Friends]]''. Joey apparently enjoys "Nickers Bars".
** And Ross uses Uberweiss laundry detergent.
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* The ''[[Masters of Horror]]'' episode "The Screwfly Solution" had plenty of examples, like "East Coast Airlines" and "Flazzle Cola" (in a red can, no less), and in the shop scenes they make sure to keep the camera zoomed out (though a Budweiser sign comes up in the edge of the shot, so they forgot at least one thing). They also have nameless "Kidney Beans" cans and an internet search engine with no marker at all.
* ''[[Law & Order|Law and Order]]'' loves this trope. Probably because many of its episodes are [[Ripped from the Headlines]].
** Though this trope doesn't apply when referring to their bankroller -- forbankroller—for instance, reporters will have NBC branded microphones, with anyone else being with unlikely-numbered news organizations such as Channel 23 or News 46. There was also an interesting exchange during a bust when mobsters were caught flat-footed watching TV:
{{quote|Det. Briscoe: "MSNBC, huh? Your father would've had the game on."}}
** Of course there are two things consistent about the L&O universe; that the equivalent of the ''Post'' is the ''Ledger'' (which was also the paper in the short-lived newsbiz [[Spin-Off]] ''[[Deadline]]''), while the all-encompassing New York University/Columbia University campus is known as Hudson University.
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* ''[[Mad Men]]'' spectacularly averts this. Sterling Cooper may be fictional, but they've done stuff or tried to do stuff for (And yes, many of these clients [[Product Placement|paid handsomely to be on the show]]):
** Pampers
** Kodak -- CallingKodak—Calling a kind of slide projector a [[wikipedia:Carousel slide projector|Carousel]] was apparently Don Draper's idea.
** American Airlines, an attempted grab for their contract of that airline, which is trying to get good publicity back after the [[wikipedia:American Airlines Flight 1|Flight 1 disaster of 1 March 1962]]. In the show, Pete Campbell's father is a victim of that crash.
** Mohawk Airlines, who are bumped off the client list for the American Airlines attempt.
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** Also worth mentioning is that the show isn't averse to ''actual'' [[Product Placement]]: a bottle of Smirnoff has crept its way into the series as a semi-permanent fixture in Roger Sterling's new office.
** DVD commentary reveals that the production team always uses period-accurate real-world alcohol bottles, with one exception: A real brand is never used in a drinking-and-driving situation. [[Mad Men]] being [[Mad Men]], there are a lot of these.
* Odd example on ''[[Peep Show]]'' -- Jeremy—Jeremy refers obliquely to a real-life advert for a popular cold and flu remedy, while Mark is shown pouring said brand into a cup, with the logo obscured... at which point Jeremy offers to "bring your Lemsip in for you". Didn't seem to be a lampshading, or deliberate joke -- justjoke—just odd.
** It may be that mentioning the semi-genericised Lemsip is acceptable, but that showing Lemsip-brand Lemsip was undue prominence. In some countries, there's a rule against showing a product and mentioning its name at the same time. So there's no problem if they're mentioning Lemsip, they just have to obscure it.
* Yet more BBC, in ''[[The Apprentice (TV series)|The Apprentice]]'' many of the candidates have worked for major companies in the past, but it is described as stuff like "developing markets for a major international coffee company."
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** Additionally, Rose works for the fictional department store 'Henricks.'
* In the episode "Doppelgänger" of ''[[NCIS]]'', the case hinged in part on two different brands of cigarettes: Triboros, and Llamas (the latter in a package resembling Camel cigarettes).
* A [[Justified Trope]] within the context of ''[[Sabrina the Teenage Witch (TV series)|Sabrina the Teenage Witch]]''. Due to legal reasons, witches cannot conjure up brand name products; trying so only results in [[Brand X]] knock-offs such as "Popsi" and "Butterthumbs".
* On ''[[Community]]'', an ill-sized oval changed Jeff's laptop's brand from a Sony Vaio, to, apparently, a teapot.
** "Cola", in an orange-red can, also appears numerous times in Community.
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* Finder-Spyder is a stand-in for Google in shows such as ''[[CSI]]'', ''[[Dexter]]'', ''[[Heroes (TV series)|Heroes]]'' and ''[[Prison Break]]''
* Gannon Car Rentals features in ''[[Lost]]'' and ''[[Heroes (TV series)|Heroes]]''.
* On ''[[Flash Forward 2009|FlashForward]]'', badges are generally removed from cars -- acars—a common enough practice, but this show is particularly blatant, in that Ford cars have a conspicuous oval gap where the badge was taken out.
* In a variation, when ''[[Life After People]]'' did an episode on food, they specifically address the [[Urban Legend]] that "this cream-filled snack cake" would remain edible for thousands of years. Presumably the makers of Twinkies didn't want their product associated with images of decaying meat or roaches and rats taking over abandoned supermarkets, as the program dutifully avoids naming "this snack cake" or showing its label.
* ''[[Wizards of Waverly Place]]'' has an episode near the start of the second season where a frisbee is referred to as a "plastic flying disk". Possibly a [[Lampshade Hanging|lampshading]], since the phrase is gratuitously awkward compared to several they could have used instead.
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* In this clip of ''[[I've Got a Secret]]'', Henry Morgan jokes that Soupy Sales (who is introduced as "Mister X") is [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1qq_Mr1txFY the maker of 'Brand X']
* In the US ''[[Queer as Folk]]'', Michael Novotny works at <s>K-Mart</s> The Big <s>K</s>Q
* Non-Canadian ''[[Degrassi]]'' viewers can almost make a game out of betting on what's [[Brand X]] and what's [[Product Placement|a real but]] [[Canada, Eh?|Canada-only]] brand.
* ''[[Are You Being Served?]]'' had Grace Brothers, a parodic stand-in for Harrods.
* Starting in Season 2, ''Glee'' introduced a coffee shop, possibly a chain, called the Lima Bean as a date location for Kurt and Blaine. It's both a reference to the place where the show is set (and its correct pronunciation) and a pretty obvious stand-in for Starbucks.
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* When licensed NASCAR products are released to mass retail, the logos of beer companies are replaced with generic logos including the driver's name, due to U.S. law prohibiting the advertising of alcohol to minors. This is not the case with high-end "adult collectibles," however.
** There's a ''cigarette lighter'' shaped like Rusty Wallace's Miller Lite car with the brewery's logo replaced by his first name.
** The high-end collectible market isn't immune to cigarette advertisement restrictions though -- thethough—the L&M logos are missing from some models.
** When Mark Martin's sponsorship was switched to Viagra, the notice "Ages 21 and up" on the Revell model box where the "tahrs and awl"-sponsored-car kits had "Ages 10 and up". If you need Viagra before 21, you're probably worried about things other than family-unfriendly logos...
* There is a Listerine commercial that actually says that "people prefer it two-to-one over the leading brand." To be fair, this can be interpreted charitably to mean "the leading brand made by a competitor." But if it's possible for "the leading brand" to mean this, then that might be the answer to the question, "Why isn't your brand the leading brand?" Maybe it sometimes is the leading brand!
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** ''Persona 3'' was ''filled'' with them, Every vending machine had some type of American drink just to show how well Atlus actually translates the games. Some of the most memorable ones were : (Dr. Salt: Salty soda. Popular, but an acquired taste.) (Mad Bull: The most caffeinated drink available.) (Starvicks: Famous coffee, mixed with cough syrup.) (Fountain Dew: A disturbingly yellow soft drink.)
* The painkillers in ''[[Max Payne (series)|Max Payne]]'' are referenced by name in ''Max Payne 2'': "Interfectum 600mg: a serious painkiller for serious pain".
* A truly vast number of freeware games -- especiallygames—especially Japanese games -- opengames—open with ripoffs of old video game loading screens. For example, "Kobami" from ''[[La-Mulana]]''.
** However in La-Mulana's case it is actually [[Lampshade Hanging|an intentional parody]].
* The Medic/Assault's first aid box in ''Battlefield 2142'' contains painkillers named "Dicepirin", among other things.
** The game was developed by DICE.
* The ''[[Fallout]]'' series has Brand X in spades -- featuringspades—featuring Snap-Off Tools, Mary May cosmetics, Nuka-Cola, and so forth. However, due to threats of [[Think of the Children|Austraila giving the game an Adults Only rating]], they needed to change Morphine to Med-X.
** [[Fridge Brilliance|So that's why it offers +25% to damage resistance!]]
* ''[[Sim City]]'' buildings fall under this. There's the Kong Tower, Quigley Insurance, Byall Means Travel Agency, Wright and Daughter, Dragon Dr., Justin Brown Plaza, Bob's Grease Pit, Curtin Fabrics, and Pump & Scoot Gas just to name a few.
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* There are some generic store-brand beers that [http://40ouncebeer.com/extrapicts/generic.jpg just have "beer" on the label.]
* There is also a brand of wine called "Cheap Red Wine", although it is meant as a gag (despite being a completely accurate description of the product).
* There is actually a drink ''called'' [[Brand X]]. At only 22% alcohol, it's a cheap knockoff of Brandy.
** [[A Worldwide Punomenon|You mean,]] [[Don't Explain the Joke|as in "Brand-Y"?]]
* Many companies have made knockoff biscuits that look like Oreos. Julie's Biscuits actually labels these as ''Stereos''.
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