Some Silly Inventions That Became Wildly Popular

Summary

Podcast Summary: Some Silly Inventions That Became Wildly Popular

Stuff You Should Know • iHeartPodcasts • April 21, 2026
Hosts: Josh Clark & Chuck Bryant

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Josh and Chuck delve into a delightful history of several “silly” inventions that, despite their apparent triviality, became massive commercial successes and genuine parts of pop culture. Through their signature banter, Josh and Chuck explore the backstories, marketing genius, and cultural impacts of products like the ThighMaster, Pocket Fisherman, Shake Weight, Big Mouth Billy Bass, and more. The episode highlights not only why these products caught on but also the quirky inventors and pitchpeople who helped turn them into household names.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

Direct Response TV Marketing and “As Seen On TV”

• [02:20] Josh: Explains the context for most of the featured inventions: products typically marketed directly to consumers via TV infomercials with “as seen on TV” branding.
• [03:25] Chuck: Details how direct response strategies let inventors pocket more profit by selling directly (think 800 numbers, not just retail).
• [03:35] Josh: Notes the risk many inventors took, sometimes mortgaging homes to fund production.

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The George Foreman Grill (Honorable Mention)

• [03:35–05:44]
  • Not considered “silly” enough for the main list, but cited as the most successful direct response product ever, amassing about $1B in sales.
  • George Foreman didn’t invent it—he was brought on as a pitchman and negotiated 45% of profits.

Josh: “Most people think George Foreman invented that grill... He did not. It was already an existing product and he was approached to basically be the pitch man for it. And very wisely, he said, sure, I'll do it, but you have to give me 45% of the profits.” [05:12]

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1. ThighMaster

• [06:24–11:07]
  • Invented as the “V-bar” by Swedish physical therapist Dr. Ann Marie Binstrom in the 1960s.
  • Suzanne Somers, famous from “Three’s Company,” became forever linked as the face of the product.
  • Somers didn’t invent it, but made ~$300 million by becoming the primary owner.
  • Commercials featured surgeon endorsements—most notably, an ophthalmologist.
  • Notable quote on the ad’s absurdity:
    Chuck: “Dr. Gould was an ophthalmologist.” [10:16]
  • Somers appeared in leotard, pantyhose, and heels—an iconic, odd image.
  • Inducted into the Direct Response Hall of Fame in 2014.

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2. Pocket Fisherman & Ron Popeil

• [11:13–15:54]
  • Pocket Fisherman: A compact fishing rod with storage in the handle—“chunkier” than necessary but fully functional.
  • Ron Popeil: The infomercial (Ronco) king, also behind Vegematic (“It slices, it dices!”), the Inside the Eggshell Scrambler, and others.
  • Notable moment:
    Chuck: "He was the guy that, you know. But wait, there's more. That came from him." [11:23]
  • Many of his inventions solved problems “no one knew existed.”
  • Product successes owed as much to Ron’s enthusiastic pitch as the inventions themselves.
  • Vegematic infomercial considered the world’s first (early 1960s).
  • Ronco amassed a couple billion in lifetime sales.

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3. Shake Weight

• [19:31–22:50]
  • Began as a “semi-legitimate” dumbbell. Its primary claim: stabilizing the spring-loaded ends provides intense muscle engagement.
  • Commercials and design quickly became viral memes due to strong sexual innuendo.
  • Despite ridicule, studies showed it generated more muscle activity than standard dumbbells (though not serious strength-building).
  • Josh: “Use something more like 300% more muscle activity than you do with traditional dumbbells.” [20:13]
  • At its peak, brought in $40 million in a single year.

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4. Big Mouth Billy Bass

• [22:56–28:45]
  • Talking, singing mounted fish that startled and delighted Americans circa 2000.
  • Invented by Joe Pelletieri, inspired by wife Barbara in a Bass Pro Shop.
  • Would turn to face you and belt out “Don’t Worry, Be Happy” or “Take Me to the River.”
  • Had a sophisticated motion sensor and animatronic head.
  • Cost $29.95 at launch (about $57 today).
  • Instant hit: $100 million in sales within a year, became a pop culture touchstone.
  • Led to knockoffs, parodies, and even appeared in TV shows like “The Sopranos.”

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5. The Bedazzler

• [29:15–33:13]
  • Desktop gadget (originally “Stud Setter”) that allowed users to attach rhinestones to clothing.
  • Invented by Herman Brickman, a Ron Popeil protégé.
  • Became huge among ‘90s youth and “Y2K” fashion, popularized by celebrities.
  • Later, the trend shifted from clothing to objects (e.g., bedazzled phone cases, Vaseline jars).
  • Notable quote:
    Chuck: “I think you need to put at least five things for it to truly bedazzle.” [30:20]

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6. Flowbee

• [37:07–43:58]
  • Vacuum-powered hair cutting attachment, invented by cabinetmaker Rick Hunt, originally called the Vacu-Cut.
  • Hunt sold his business to fund the Flowbee and took it straight to direct-response TV after salons and big brands passed.
  • Infomercials faked as real TV talk shows; Flowbee was demonstrated in oddly compelling fashion.
  • Priced between $70–$150; about 2 million sold.
  • Achieved new life during COVID-19—and has a celebrity fan in George Clooney.
  • Josh: “Hats off, Rick Hunt, for sticking to your dreams, your vision. I think Rick Hunt demonstrates a lesson for all of us.” [43:58]

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7. The Snuggie

• [44:00–46:51]
  • The infamous “blanket with sleeves.”
  • Snuggies became a national joke and a genuine comfort fad, selling 25 million for ~$500M.
  • The “laid back satanic cult” vibes of commercials were noted for their unintentional oddness.
  • Snuggie wasn’t original; the Slanket and other variants preceded it, but name and marketing made this the hit.
  • Snuggies became Halloween costumes and party staples in the late 2000s.

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• Josh, on invention pitchmen:
  “There’s loads of esteem going his way from us.” [02:20]
• Chuck, on ThighMaster’s medical endorsement:
  “Dr. Gould was an ophthalmologist.” [10:16]
• Josh, on Pocket Fisherman:
  “They look vaguely like a staple gun that you break off the handle from and put between your legs and squeeze staples into your... the insides of your thighs.” [15:40]
• Chuck, on Bedazzler economics:
  “Apparently Ron Papil, at one point, as a selling point, said it can make an $8 pair of jeans worth up to $50.” [30:22]
• Chuck, on Snuggie commercials:
  “[They] looked like members of a laid back satanic cult.” [45:12]
• Josh, on the inventors:
  “He really... sold his cabinetry business to fund this... He went to salons and salons are like, no, we don’t want to sell this. It’s going to cut into our business.” [42:09]

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Segment Timestamps

• 01:41 – Start of discussion, direct response marketing introduction
• 03:35 – George Foreman Grill discussion
• 06:24 – ThighMaster origin and history
• 11:13 – Pocket Fisherman, Ron Popeil & infomercial legacy
• 19:31 – The Shake Weight: design, mockery, and actual effects
• 22:56 – Big Mouth Billy Bass: invention story and impact
• 29:15 – Bedazzler: origins, cultural impact, Y2K style
• 37:07 – Flowbee: humble roots, infomercial fame, George Clooney’s hair
• 44:00 – Snuggie: cultural phenomenon and copycats
• 46:58 – Episode wrap-up and transition to listener interaction

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Original Tone & Language

Josh and Chuck balance irreverence, nostalgia, and genuine appreciation for the business acumen and cultural impact behind these “silly” inventions. They affectionately tease the absurdities of both the products and their marketing, while recognizing the inventors’ perseverance and occasional accidental genius.

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Summary Table: The Wildly Popular “Silly” Inventions

| Product | Notable Face/Pitchperson | Key Year(s) | Noteworthy Detail | Est. Sales | |----------------------|-------------------------|--------------|------------------------|--------------------| | ThighMaster | Suzanne Somers | 1991+ | Rebranded V-bar; owned by Somers | ~$300M+ | | Pocket Fisherman | Ron Popeil | 1970s–90s | “Solves a problem we didn’t know existed” | Part of Ronco's $2B+ | | Shake Weight | — | 2010 | Parodied for double-entendre, actually worked for cardio | $40M (in a year) | | Big Mouth Billy Bass | Joe Pelletieri | 2000 | Animatronic singing fish; huge novelty | $100M | | Bedazzler | — | Late ’70s, 1990s | “Make $8 jeans worth up to $50” | N/A | | Flowbee | Rick Hunt | 1988+ | Vacuum haircutting; 2M sold; George Clooney uses | 2M units | | Snuggie | — | 2008–2013 | “Blanket with sleeves,” 25 million sold | $500M |

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For Those Who Haven’t Listened

This episode is for anyone who’s ever been fascinated by pop culture oddities, infomercial phenomena, or the quirks of American consumerism. Discover how strange ideas—pitched with the right passion, timing, and a bit of TV magic—can become part of everyday life. As Josh and Chuck show, sometimes inventors and pitch people are having the last laugh all the way to the bank.

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Skip the ads and outros: the fun is in the stories behind every offbeat gadget you’ve ever seen on TV—sometimes, silliness really pays.

Transcript

[Chuck Bryant]

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[Josh Clark]

Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh. And there's Chuck. And Jerry's here too. And it's time to buckle down and get serious about some silly inventions that turned out to be pretty popular.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, man, this takes me right back.

[Josh Clark]

It does, because this is a super kind of 80s, but I really associate most of this with the 90s, don't you?

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, I just mean this episode takes me Back to like 2012.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, gotcha. But yeah, sure, yeah. Well, this. This article was clearly written around 2009 or 2010 by our esteemed colleague, Jonathan Strickland.

[Chuck Bryant]

Esteemed?

[Josh Clark]

Oh, yeah, there's loads of esteem going his Way from us. We're talking today about some silly inventions. Typically they were what you would call direct response TV marketed types of inventions or products. Right. Which are what? Those like the little thing, at least in the United States, that little red icon that says as seen on tv. Those are basically across the board direct response TV marketed products.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. And by direct response, that basically means we want to make more money and we'll do that by making like an infomercial. And instead of the infomercial saying like, and now go to your store and buy this thing. Even though a lot of the stuff you could find in drugstores and like maybe a bed, bath and beyond or something like that.

[Josh Clark]

Sure.

[Chuck Bryant]

But generally what they were trying to do was sell direct to you. Get a direct response by putting like an 800 number up. You could call and order. So that just means they get more juice for themselves since they're not having to sell it through a store.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. And often like, yes, of course they wanted more profit, but they also wanted to be able to pay off the third mortgage they took out on their house to get this invention of theirs out.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

Maybe public. You know, there's a lot of these that were just invented by some person. You know, it was a good idea. And luckily for them, they took off and became super popular. So there's one that it wouldn't qualify in any really way, shape or form as a silly invention. So we didn't include it on this list. But it is the most, the greatest selling direct response TV marketed product of all time, far and away. And it's the George Foreman grill. From what I saw in the last like 20 plus years, more like 30 years. I think it sold about a billion dollars worth of product. That is pretty significant. I don't know if you're counting, but a billion dollars still means a lot these days.

[Chuck Bryant]

It does. I never had a Foreman grill. I never owned one, but I lived with one for a year.

[Josh Clark]

Oh yeah? Did it pay its share of the rent?

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, no. I think one of my roommates had one year, I feel like in college. And you know, if you don't know what those were, the whole trick is it's like any kind of standard panini press or something, except they raised up one side of it so grease could trickle out of it. And that was about the only difference, I think. Right?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. But the thing is, it really works. Yumi and I have one and we use it. Basically anytime we cook burgers, we use it. And I mean, like there's no loss of taste, but there's a ton of, like, fat that's just. Just drips right out. So we use ours pretty frequently.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's funny. I don't think I knew that you guys had a Foreman.

[Josh Clark]

We do. And one other thing about this, too. This is another thing too, with direct response products. Most people think George Foreman invented that grill because he refers to it in the ads as his grill. He did not. It was already an existing product and he was approached to basically be the pitch man for it. And very wisely, he said, sure, I'll do it, but. But you have to give me 45% of the profits.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, he made a lot of money on those things.

[Josh Clark]

Just crazy gobs of money.

[Chuck Bryant]

Good for him.

[Josh Clark]

And there's a similar. So moving into our list now, Chuck, and this is in very much stuff you should know. Tradition. Not a top 10. Not a. Not a full 10. Top 10 list, I guess, is what we call this kind of thing.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, I don't know that we've ever done 10. And we're never gonna.

[Josh Clark]

We better not. If we did, at some point, we need to find that episode and go edit out one of them.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Or maybe that's like our very last episode will be a true 10.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, yeah, that's a good one.

[Chuck Bryant]

That'll be the tell. Everyone will know.

[Josh Clark]

We could do a top 10 of our top 10 episodes.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, that sounds stupid. Sounds like a great way to finish, actually.

[Josh Clark]

So the segue, I guess, from George Foreman to the first on our list is the idea that people tended to think Suzanne Somers may have invented the ThighMaster. She did not. Just like George Foreman, she was approached to become the pitch person for an existing invention. And she thanked her lucky stars all the way to the bank later on that she agreed to it.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. If you're of a certain age, you may not even know who Suzanne Somers is. Or you may know her as the ThighMaster lady. If you're a little bit older, if you're in our generation and above, you know her as Chrissy from the great, great sitcom Three's Company.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, Threes. Company. Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Great show.

[Josh Clark]

She was also on. She's. She's the Sheriff, though. That was a good one.

[Chuck Bryant]

I didn't. I've never even heard of that show.

[Josh Clark]

It was the kind of show that would come on at 3:30pm Saturday right after reruns of Mama's Family. Okay.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, I've really never heard of she's the Sheriff. I take it she was a sheriff.

[Josh Clark]

She was the sheriff. Okay. It was a good show. But, yes, of course, Three's Company. Chrissy is who she is vastly, far and away better known for. But by the. I mean, that was like, the late 70s, early 80s when she left Three's company. Apparently she was making 120 grand less an episode than Jack John Ritter. So she's like, I'm out of here. And there was kind of a lull in her career between then and, I guess, 1991 when she came back with a vengeance on TV pitching this ThighMaster.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, pitching the V bar. That's what it was originally called when a Swedish physical therapist named Dr. Ann Marie Binstrom invented this thing in the 60s. But they tweaked it a little bit. They made it look cooler. They made it a little more colorful and brought it into the 80s, early 90s, and approached her to, like you said, like, hey, you know, you're a very recognizable face, and you're into fitness and you're a smart lady. She played a dingbat on Three's Company. But Suzanne Somers is a very smart woman, as evidenced by the perhaps $300 million she made on Hawk and the ThighMaster and eventually, like, buying out the partners to where she outright owned it.

[Josh Clark]

That's awesome. So you said that this is an existing device, right, The V bar. Yes. So what it was, we should just say real quick, the ThighMaster or the V bar, was this kind of device. What would you liken it to? You know, those, like, paper chip clips?

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, I'm just ready for you to confuse everybody. Go ahead.

[Josh Clark]

Okay. It's like a giant paper chip clip, but it doesn't open up, so you couldn't clip it to anything. It's just the squeezing part. So go to your kitchen right now, get a paper chip clip, break off the part that opens up, and then put the little remaining part, that's like a V, the V bar, between your legs, and squeeze. And what you're doing is using a mini Thigh Master right now.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. You do the same thing with your fingers if you wanted to.

[Josh Clark]

Right. So they made it pop, and they hid the spring in the middle, and they gave it some great coloring. And this was now the ThighMaster that Suzanne Somers was now demonstrating on some very famous TV ads, again starting in 1991.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. And I guess the only other thing we should mention is that there was a physician on a lot of these commercials. There was a guy wearing a lab coat, Dr. Herbert L. Gould, who was there to recommend the thing and saying that he uses it and the cherry on top is that Dr. Gould was an ophthalmologist.

[Josh Clark]

Isn't that great?

[Chuck Bryant]

Not that that doesn't, you know. I mean, still a doctor. Still use the thing, I guess.

[Josh Clark]

For sure. Yeah. It's not illegitimate. It's just funny.

[Chuck Bryant]

Clearly knew Suzanne Somers somehow. Probably.

[Josh Clark]

Or they just started picking doctors at random now.

[Chuck Bryant]

I think he was probably her ophthalmologist would be my guess.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, you're probably right. I feel like there is one more thing we should mention about the ad, and that is the fact that Suzanne Somers appeared in it wearing a leotard, like you would think, for working out. But also pantyhose and high heels, which is a specific kind of look.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Oh, actually, there is one more thing, because this is. We buried the lead. The probably most interesting thing about all of this is that there is a direct response hall of fame. And she's in it.

[Josh Clark]

Yep. She was inducted in 2014, and rightly so.

[Chuck Bryant]

Amazing.

[Josh Clark]

Take an early break or move on?

[Chuck Bryant]

No, we gotta move on.

[Josh Clark]

Okay, so I say we move on to the Pocket Fisherman. And a little bit of a bio on Ron Popeil, one of the great salesmen of all time.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, yeah. Ron Papil. If you had a TV in the 1980s and 90s, then you have seen this dude. He was the guy that, you know. But wait, there's more. That came from him. He originated that term. He was popular in the. I guess even the, like, the 50s and early 60s when he made the first infomercial for the Vegematic. It slices, it dices like. That was Ron Papil. All these sort of tropes of infomercials, a lot of them come from the great Ron Papil.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, that Vegematic infomercial, that was, like, the world's first one. So, yes, he was infomercial God. And he got his start. He was always good at selling things. Apparently by the time he was 16, he was selling his dad's inventions at flea markets and grossing about 500 bucks a day. And that's in $1951. So that's like $10 million a day today. And within just a few years, he was a household name, thanks to television. And it was largely built on that Vegematic that apparently his dad invented.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, it was, you know, it's a veggie chopper.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. Manual food processor. That's it. But because he was. He could get so excited about any wacky, weird invention and try to make you excited. About it. And there was just no ignoring this guy.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. He had the in Shell egg scrambler. And that was a device where if you didn't want to crack your egg, put it in a bowl and scramble it, you could use this little device that had a little bent pin that went inside the eggshell and spun around. Very interesting invention. And the GLH, which stood for great looking hair, the GLH Formula 9 hair system, which is basically spray paint for bald spots.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, it was like aerosol spray hair, like product or something like that.

[Chuck Bryant]

Remember when Rudy Giuliani sweated his. Sweated that stuff down the side of his face?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, I do.

[Chuck Bryant]

It was amazing. It was like what a time when he was on TV in front of like, sweating what looked like shoe polish and then standing in front of that horse.

[Josh Clark]

Seasoned landscape.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, my God, what a time to be alive. Amazing. It was like SNL come to life.

[Josh Clark]

It really was moment after moment, too. Something new. Yeah, inside the eggshell scrambler too, by the way. So one of the other things about all these products are their ads are magnificent. Sometimes they're magnificently terrible or just so absurd or just unintentionally salacious. But this, this inside the Eggshell scrambler ad had a little kid sitting at a table and he had been served like runny eggs. And it's the TV announcer says, no more runny eggs. And the kid looks at his plate and kind of gags a little bit.

[Chuck Bryant]

Good Lord, I love runny eggs.

[Josh Clark]

Well, this kid didn't. And apparently neither did Ron Popeil because he used it as a selling point.

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, his company because he was run, was called Ronco. They've done a couple of billion in sales over the year. And part of that chunk is owed to the Pocket Fisherman, which is the one on the list here. And that's. You can still get a Pocket Fisherman. It is a exactly what it sounds like. It's a compact fishing rod that folds up very small. It has a little compartment in the handle to hold some stuff. And it's, you know, the problem with the pocket fishermen. Like, it works. If you go on YouTube, there are plenty of examples of people using this thing and catching like decent sized fish even. It's just not, I think you had in here. Maybe it was Strickland that said it solves a problem that we didn't know existed. And that's kind of true because, you know, if you're going camping, let's say, or backpacking and you pack up and break down a regular sized fishing rod, it Straps on the outside of your backpack. No problem. And it's not really that big or in the way. So the pocket fishermen just took it a little further, I guess.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. And made it chunkier.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. They're cool looking.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. They look vaguely like a staple gun.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, okay.

[Josh Clark]

That you. You break off the handle from. And put between your legs and squeeze staples. Staples. Into your. The insides of your thighs. That's what it looks like.

[Chuck Bryant]

I think we should definitely take that break now.

[Josh Clark]

Okay.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right. We'll be right back with a few more right after this. Hey, everybody, we gotta tell you, it's way day at Wayfair. From April 25th through the 27th, you can score the best deals in home. Like up to 80% off with free shipping on everything.

[Josh Clark]

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[Chuck Bryant]

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[Josh Clark]

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[Chuck Bryant]

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[Josh Clark]

Each episode busts myths, decodes health trends, and gives you practical, trustworthy advice straight from the people behind the counter. No white coats, no lectures. Just real talk, real answers, and maybe a few laughs. Listen to beyond the script on the iHeartRadio app. Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

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[Chuck Bryant]

All right, we're back, everybody. And next on the list we have the Shake Weight, which is a, you know, a semi legitimate piece of workout equipment. It's kind of like a dumbbell, if you picture a dumbbell, but instead of just lifting the dumbbell, you put both hands on it and move it and there's a spring in the middle and the two ends of the dumbbell, like, move, like when you shake it. A shake Weight. That's what it is. But it became popular not because of its how well it worked or how good of a piece of gear it was. It became popular because of the clearly obvious sexual innuendo that that comes about while operating.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, we don't really need to explain it. Just go look at a Shakeway ad and you'll immediately understand what we're talking about. Yeah, the thing is though, Chuck, is it does seem to have worked, right? Like you're basically instead of you moving, the weight is moving and what you're trying to do is stabilize it. And what the shake weight makers were saying is like, hey man, this requires way more muscle exertion than traditional dumbbell lifting. And they commissioned some studies that basically said, yeah, this actually is correct. Use something more like 300% more muscle activity than you do with traditional dumbbells. And in like 1/6 of the time, too. And plus, I think they had a two and a half pound version that was for women, apparently, and then one that was double The Weight for men. And the 2 1/2 pound version burned as many calories as a 12 pound dumbbell. So all of this checked out. Yeah, but again, that's not really what people were buying the Shake Weight for.

[Chuck Bryant]

No, it was parodied sort of all over the place, obviously on stuff like SNL, Ellen DeGeneres, and, you know, it was just one of those funny things that hit like virally early on because of how it looked when you used it. You know, I imagine it was a pretty decent cardio workout. I don't think I've ever seen one in person or touched one.

[Josh Clark]

I don't believe I have either.

[Chuck Bryant]

I lived with one for a while.

[Josh Clark]

Did you? No, it was. It was a mean drunk.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. I wonder if these things had. If they were like in actual gyms.

[Josh Clark]

I don't know. I like, this is one of the things, like when it comes to exercise equipment like the ThighMaster 2, the Shake Weight was like, there was article after article, like, it doesn't really work. It actually works. And from what I saw, the consensus seemed to be that it definitely did give you a workout. Like you could feel it. But for as far as strength training, which is what most people use dumbbells for, it wasn't going to help you very much for that.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, probably pretty good cardio, though, like I said. And I imagine it was a pretty decent forearm workout, you know.

[Josh Clark]

Right, exactly. But yes, I'm sure most people wouldn't have been caught dead at the gym using one of those things. All right, well, that was the Shakeaway. Oh, one other thing. I saw that in one year, I think this was 2010, they made something like $40 million off of it.

[Chuck Bryant]

Man, these things, it's crazy.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, it is pretty impressive. So what's up next, Charles?

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, we gotta go with Big Mouth. I couldn't even say it right. Almost said Billy Big Mouth, but that's just what I called mine. Big Mouth. Billy Bass took the world by storm in the early 2000s. And if you don't know what I'm talking about, it is if you've ever seen a taxidermied fish mounted on a plaque on the wall, like a big largemouth bass. Imagine if that thing came to life and sang don't worry, be happy to you.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, this thing had a real Evil Dead vibe to it.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, I think so. Take Me to the river was the other one of the two original or not original songs, but you know what I mean, the first songs that the Billy Bass played.

[Josh Clark]

Right. And this is in 2000, when Billy Bass spent its year in the limelight. But the story goes back a couple of years earlier, and the inventor Joe Pelletieri and his wife Barbara were out on a road trip. Joe was looking for the next big idea. He was a VP at a novelty company, and he was trying to figure out, you know, what to do. I think he had kind of hit a dry patch and was a little concerned. And they ended up at a bass pro shop on their road trip. And his wife Barbara, knowing that he was trying to come up with a new idea, said, why not a mounted fish that sings? And Joe said, barbara, I could kiss you. And she says, well, what are you waiting for? And they kissed.

[Chuck Bryant]

I wonder how that went down. Was she literally walking around a bass pro shop and saw a taxidermied fish and said, wouldn't it be great if that thing sang Don't Worry, Be Happy?

[Josh Clark]

That's how I envision it.

[Chuck Bryant]

Just what a while. I mean, was she on peyote?

[Josh Clark]

I don't know. Yeah. Maybe she didn't even think of it. She saw it, you know. Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

It's such a weird thing to conjure up, but I love it. And it was a very, very fun product. Like, out of all these, to me, this is the most kind of fun thing that you might want to have on your wall.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. And I think it's great. They went with Don't Worry, Be Happy too. Take Me to the River. You understand that it's pretty funny. But Don't Worry, Be Happy. That was like the smash hit of 1988. Like, it had been dead and gone for over a decade. And they brought that thing back with Big Mouth Billy Bass.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yes. Hard to get that out, isn't it?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, it is.

[Chuck Bryant]

So the thing was actually for what it was, it was a fairly sophisticated piece of gear. They had a sensor inside of it, so when you walk by it, it would pick up on that and just automatically start singing. And he had some designs that he did over the years that he didn't love, but he really hit on it when I guess his wife Barbara probably said, well, why don't you have the thing turn its head out and sort of look at the person they're serenading? And he was like, by God, Barbara, we've got a kiss again.

[Josh Clark]

Right. And that was a big deal. Like, you did not see things that did that, that turned away from the plaque and looked at you to sing. That put the novel in novelty for Big Mouth Billy Bass, if you ask me.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. So, like, I was Saying though it was a pretty sophisticated thing, the way it all worked. And for 29.95, you know, they took a long time to build. It wasn't cheap, it was a well made piece of gear. It was 40 days to build one. So I think Jimmy G E M M Y was the company that he. Which still owns the big mouth Billy Bass that he was working for. But they didn't know it was gonna be such a big deal, so. And like I said. Cause it took so long to make, they ended up shorthanded. And these things were going on ebay for like three times the amount.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. And I mean, 29.95 in 2000 was about $57 today for a. A latex singing fish, essentially. But it just. It hit just right and it became like basically the big thing in 2000 in the United States. And in very short order, competitors came out and knockoffs came out. And then they showed up with different songs too. I Will Survive Staying Alive ymca Of course, this was during a disco revival, if you'll remember correctly. And I found. I didn't send this to you, I don't think. But the Royal Palm Shuffleboard Club, the Chicago location. Along one wall they have more than 70 big mouth Billy Bass.

[Chuck Bryant]

Wow.

[Josh Clark]

Nightmare fuel that they have choreographed, not even to do, to sing in unison. Like one will sing the main part and the others will turn and like sing the chorus and stuff like that. But they sing Staying Alive, they sing Talking Heads Once in a Lifetime. And then they sing choices by E40. So it's really something to see if you go look up the video.

[Chuck Bryant]

Wow. I gotta check that out. That took some pretty brilliant wiring, I imagine.

[Josh Clark]

I can't. I think it was just timing. I don't know how they did it, but it's really impressive. But yeah, it is a little haunting for sure. Because they have dead eyes. I never really thought about it before, but that's the. The thing. One of the things that makes it so absurd is the fish looks dead still. You know what I mean? They didn't try to make it look alive. It looks like a dead mounted fish come to life or come to reanimation singing to you.

[Chuck Bryant]

I never really thought about that.

[Josh Clark]

I didn't either until just the second Chuck.

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, he sold about $100 million worth of these things. It was popular for about a year, which is all you need really. And they don't even advertise their product. So this was all word of mouth. Like somebody would see it in someone's house and you know in the bathroom. They would go to use the bathroom, and this bass would start singing to them. And before you know it, they're buying four of them to give to their friends and so on and so on. And they don't realize when they buy it, though, is, you know, that motion sensor worked pretty well. And so you got sick of it pretty quickly, I think.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, for sure. And America as a whole got sick of it pretty quickly. So, like you said, a year's pretty much all you need. And we moved on, but not before. Like, it appeared in all sorts of different TV shows. And, like, it was parodied, too. And I think it played a role in an episode of Murder, She Wrote. Nope. It was on Sopranos, though. There was a. Like, a. At least one episode where it showed up, and it was kind of like a McGuffin maybe.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, God. Can we move on to the Bedazzler?

[Josh Clark]

Yes.

[Chuck Bryant]

This was a big deal. This came from a guy named Herman Brickman, who was a protege of Ron Papille, and he invented it in the late 70s. It was called the stud setter or the Ronco Rhinestone at first. And, you know, it was like, kids used it some in the 80s, but in the 90s, it became a really big deal because people like Paris Hilton and Britney Spears, it became like a fashion thing because people would bedazzle. Like, there was a lot of denim, like, denim jackets and jeans and stuff like that.

[Josh Clark]

Just to kind of get across what you're doing here. This is pretty involved. But you take, say, a pair of jeans maybe around the pocket, and you slide that bit of fabric in between the backstop, the bottom of the thing, the base of the thing, and the plunger. And under the plunger, you put a setter and the rhinestone. You plunge it down, and all of a sudden, you've just bedazzled your jeans. Well, you. Yeah, you've put one bedazzle onto your jeans, and you have a lot of work ahead of you.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, I think you need to put at least five things for it to truly bedazzle.

[Josh Clark]

That seems like the minimum. Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. But, yeah, it looks kind of like a stapler and Mental Floss. You got some stuff from Mental Floss on this one. And apparently Ron Papil, at one point, as a selling point, said it can make an $8 pair of jeans worth up to $50.

[Josh Clark]

The thing that kills me from that is worth up to $50.

[Chuck Bryant]

Like, are you going to go sell them or something?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, I guess so. I think that's what he was suggesting.

[Chuck Bryant]

I think people did that, actually.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. So it's identified as a Y2K fashion trend that came from millennium optimism. I don't remember optimism of the millennium, do you? I remember, like, fear and dread.

[Chuck Bryant]

Hmm. I don't remember. I remember the fear and dread about the Y2K bug. But maybe after that there was optimism because we were now, like, living in the future or something. I don't know. I don't remember.

[Josh Clark]

Maybe. Maybe I was pretty out of it

[Chuck Bryant]

at the time, for sure.

[Josh Clark]

But I'm talking more about, like, the whole X Files zeitgeist. You know, it was really paranoid and just kind of dark. I don't know. I always think of it as, like, people were just kind of worried on a really unconscious level about what was going to happen.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's just you, buddy.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, maybe it was. So it's made a comeback. Chuck, if you go on to TikTok or Instagram and you say bedazzle in the little search bar, it'll bring up, like, little videos of people bedazzling stuff. They don't use the Bedazzler machine anymore because you can. I think people still bedazzle clothes here or there, but this is more like the current trend is more about, like, bedazzling objects instead.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, I've definitely seen bedazzled cell phone cases and stuff like that. And I know that I guess you've seen Vaseline jars. Bedazzled. Where are you seeing these?

[Josh Clark]

I saw it on, man. I can't remember where I saw it, but somebody took a little mini Vaseline brand Vaseline petroleum jelly jar and did. Just redid the whole thing in different colored rhinestones. And it looks like a. It's a bedazzled Vaseline jar. It's pretty impressive.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, I mean, I guess if you need. If you need to grease yourself up, you might as well have fun doing it.

[Josh Clark]

So the thing is, though, is, like, since you can't use the bedazzling machine, you're just kind of, like, kind of tediously, like, applying one after the other with an adhesive. There's not the whole satisfying plunge of applying them. So it's a little more of a craft these days. Like a. Kind of a meditative, tedious craft as opposed to, like, the whole rock and roll ethos of the original Bedazzler that was in the 90s.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, it's like the origami of, you know, blingy crafts.

[Josh Clark]

All right, Chuck, we're down to our last two, if you can believe it or not, I think we're going to end up doing eight total, because remember, we're not including the Foreman Grill. That's not silly. And it was the intro, everybody. Don't get confused here.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, well, I guess we need to take the break then.

[Josh Clark]

Oh boy. Thank you for thinking of that because Jerry would have killed us.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right, we'll be back right after this with oh boy. I'm not even going to say. You just got to wait and see.

[Josh Clark]

You ever been to the pharmacy counter and the pharmacist asks, do you have any questions? And suddenly your mind goes blank? Well, that's exactly why you need to listen to beyond the Script from CVS Pharmacy and iHeartMedia.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. It's hosted by Dr. Jake Goodman, and this podcast brings you real conversations with CBS pharmacists, the health experts you see most answering the questions you wish you'd asked, like which medications may not mix well, what vaccines you should consider before a big trip, and even those questions that you were too embarrassed to say out loud.

[Josh Clark]

Each episode busts myths, decodes health trends, and gives you practical, trustworthy advice straight from the people behind the counter. No white coats, no lectures. Just real talk, real answers and maybe a few laughs. Listen to beyond the script on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

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[Josh Clark]

we've all done it, tumbled down an Internet rabbit hole trying to self diagnose and sometimes doing our own research can leave us More anxious than informed. Your feed is packed with wellness trends telling you to cold plunge protein max, detox, track your sleep. But what's actually real, what's exaggerated, what's just wrong?

[Chuck Bryant]

That's exactly what Health vs Hype from the American Medical association and iHeartMedia's Ruby Studio is here to find out each episode. Emmy nominated science communicator Trace Dominguez, who's racked up billions of views across PBS, Discovery Channel, and YouTube, talks to doctors, influencers, and real people trying these trends.

[Josh Clark]

Not to cancel them, not to hype them more, but to actually understand them. Because when it comes to your health, who you listen to matters, start asking better questions. And Listen to Health vs Hype on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Okay, Chuck, we're back. And you wouldn't say what was coming up next. You left it to me. So I'll just tell everybody we're about to go dive into the Flowbee.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. What episode did we talk about the Flowbee on?

[Josh Clark]

It doesn't ring a bell.

[Chuck Bryant]

We've talked about it at some point because I remember mentioning that we almost bought one in our college house. Kind of late night one night, like you do, you're up late doing God knows what, and you see the infomercial come on and you're all like, we should get one of those and cut each other's hair. But then in true college fashion, no one ever follows up on that and does it.

[Josh Clark]

That's because no one had a credit card that they were willing to bust out.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, that's true. I had that college Amex.

[Josh Clark]

That's. Yeah, I had college Capital One. That's how it works, though. Like those late night commercials, essentially. I would guess probably 50, 60% of sales of all these products come from people ordering them while they're drunk.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, probably.

[Josh Clark]

So it's got to be like. That explains quite a bit of it. So the Flowbee, this is like a humble, legitimate invention. Oh, by the way, we must have talked about it in our How Vacuum Attachments Work episode.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, that was it.

[Josh Clark]

But this guy, this was invented by a guy named Rick Hunt, who I saw the original infomercial for this, and he said that he was dissatisfied with the haircuts he was getting and that they grew out too fast and wouldn't it be great if he could keep up with it himself. And he wasn't in the salon hairstyling industry. He wasn't even in the vacuum industry. He was a carpenter who owned A cabinetry company out in California. So he was a California cabinet carpenter. That would have been better if all of it had rolled off the tongue. And his name was Rick Hunt. So I don't know if I said that or not.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, just a humble carpenter, much like Jesus and Harrison Ford. So he gives up. He believes in this thing so much, he gives up his carpentry business. He sells it, in fact, to help fund it. Went around to county fairs demonstrating this thing. He called it the vacu cut at first, but eventually renamed it the flow bee. Cause it makes, like, a buzzing sound like a bee. And he colored it thusly. It was, like, yellow and black. And it's. You know, if you don't know what this thing is, it attaches to a vacuum cleaner. And so you gotta have one of those, of course, and it engages the vacuum and pulls your hair into a. You know, they have these, like, recessed hair trimmer blades in there, and they had different attachments to cut it at different lengths, so it would just suck in your hair. So, you know, I saw a guy went on YouTube today to see it demonstrated and modern times. And I guess this is during COVID because the guy was like, hey, these are great things to have around right now. During COVID Yeah. And, yeah, you just sort of suck some up and then push it back down and pull it out and push it down all over your hair evenly. And it supposedly does a decent job of cutting your hair.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. So, you know, when you go to, you know, great clips or Van Michael or something like that, the hairstylist will put their hand, their fingers through your hair and pull up and put tension on your hair to make it easier to cut. That's what the vacuum suction does to your hair. So that means that you don't need to have somebody with extra hands to cut your hair, which technically, you can do yourself. This thing you just run over your head. And that was always. Essentially, the big selling point for the FlowBee is, well, two of them. One, you can cut your own hair anytime you want. Well, three, two, you're gonna save a ton of money. The flowbe is gonna pay for itself in a couple of months, depending on the size of your family. And then three, no clippings to pick up, because it all gets sucked right into your shop vac.

[Chuck Bryant]

No muss, no fuss. The problem for me is I love getting a haircut.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, me too. I get to go hang out with my buddy Michael, who does my hair.

[Chuck Bryant]

I get to hang out with my friend Robin. And it's always good. It's fun. It's sort of like I don't do spa treatments much, so this is sort of like a spa treatment treatment for me. Get my hair washed by somebody. It's the best.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, it is nice. Do you get a hot towel and like a little lavender essential oil?

[Chuck Bryant]

No, she doesn't do like, it's not like one of those men's barbershops where they offer you a whiskey and.

[Josh Clark]

No, no.

[Chuck Bryant]

And the hot towel treatment. But she does a great job.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, no, neither is mine. It's a salon for sure. So let's see. Oh, so I wanted to say also, one of the reasons the flowbe gets to me is Rick Hunt's like, he was kind of the person I was referencing at the beginning where like he really, I think you might have said he sold his cabinetry business to fund this. And he started pounding the pavement. He's like, I've got a great idea here and I've got to just get it out there. He went to Norelco. He went to Conair. He went to Remington. I saw there was a great article on mental floss that really kind of covered the flow beat. But he was getting nowhere. He went to salons and salons are like, no, we don't want to sell this. It's going to cut into our business.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

So he did what most great silly inventors have done. He took it directly to the consumer. He created a direct response infomercial. He ponied up $30,000 of his own money to produce a 30 minute infomercial. And it first aired in 1988. And the premise of it is it's a fake show. The show is new products and ideas which doesn't exist. It was just for the show and it was hosted by Lenny McGill. No one knows who that is. Had a synth soundtrack and the guest just happened to be Rick Huntz. And like he just demonstrates the flowbeat and you could get it directly through that infomercial and it just started to take off from there.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. A 30 minute infomercial for something that takes 90 seconds to describe is. And demonstrate too. Probably we haven't seen padding like that since probably this episode of ours.

[Josh Clark]

That was a low blow, but pretty hilarious.

[Chuck Bryant]

They sold between $70 and $150 a piece. He sold about 2 million of them. So they sold a ton of these. And if you go on YouTube to type in flowbee, if you want to see a demonstration, one of the top things that'll come up is George Clooney, because he's been on. I saw him on Kimmel. I know he's been on CBS Sunday Morning. Apparently has been non ironically using the Flowbe for decades on himself is what he says, at least.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, he said, listen, man, it works. Yeah, he was. Yeah. Non ironically is a great way to put it. So that's it for the Flowbee. Hats off, Rick Hunts for sticking to your. Your dreams, your vision. I think Rick Hunt demonstrates a lesson for all of us.

[Chuck Bryant]

Agreed.

[Josh Clark]

And then last up, Chuck, we have one that's a little dear to my heart. The Snuggie.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, I never had a Snuggie. The Snuggie is a blanket with sleeves, Full stop.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, you can wear it. Essentially, it's a blanket you can wear. It's open in the back like a hospital gown, basically. I don't remember what like. I think the current Snuggies are made of fleece, but the original ones were definitely not fleece. They were like the most chemically chemical fabric you can possibly imagine.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, man.

[Josh Clark]

And you would get them at like, like drugstores, that kind of thing. But they originally started as a direct response TV campaign and they made a splash, like almost out of the gate. They were just this talked about item. In 2008, 2009, 2010, I saw there was a blogger who I could not find the name of. If this was you, write in and let us know because it was great. They said that the people in the Snuggie commercial who are just doing like everyday stuff but wearing this blanket. He said they all looked like members of a laid back satanic culture.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's amazing.

[Josh Clark]

It's pretty good.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's a cult I wouldn't mind being in. Actually the only cult that appeals to me.

[Josh Clark]

The Snuggie cult.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, they sold a ton of them though. Like all of these. That seems to be a recurring theme. They sold 25 million Snuggies. So not $25 million. That's about 500 million bucks. And they did that generally between 2008 and topped out at that number by 2013. So it wasn't. It wasn't a one year wonder. It was, you know, it had a little bit of staying power.

[Josh Clark]

It did. And Snuggie wasn't the first one, apparently. The very first blanket with sleeves was called the Slanket, which was invented by a freshman at University of Maine in, I think, 1998. His name was Derek Flag. And that made its splash, I guess on qvc. And I think it enjoyed Like a resurgence during the Snuggie era. But even before the Snuggie and after the Slanket, there was the Freedom blanket, the Book blanket, the Cuddle wrap, the Toasty wrap. The difference was Snuggie went all in on their direct response TV campaign. And I think the cute name really helped too.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, for sure. And you never know when you're, you know, something is just going to hit the zeitgeist in just the right way, you know?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. And I said it had a place in my heart. The Snuggie did. That's because for Halloween 2009, which is the best Halloween I've had as an adult in my life, Yumi went as a Snuggie. And it was a lot of fun. We walked around New York and then went to a friend's party, our friend Adam's party, and just had a great night.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, that's awesome.

[Josh Clark]

So I think that's it, Chuck. 40 minutes of high quality stuff. You should know podcasting has just been completed.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, 42 and a half minutes if you want to get technical.

[Josh Clark]

Oh God, I guess I started after you.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh no.

[Josh Clark]

Mine says 4115 now.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh my God. I hope this isn't a big edit job for Jerry.

[Josh Clark]

Well, since Chuck worried about the edit job for Jerry, I think that means it's listener mail time, don't you?

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. Instead of listener mail, though, we're gonna do an Instagram comment.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, okay.

[Chuck Bryant]

Because I couldn't find to get into listener mail, but I went to our Instagram page, which is, I think Sysk Podcast Correct is the name of it. And you know, we're going to start doing some more fun stuff over there, by the way, if you want to give it a follow. But this is from AJ Greek 6. AJ G R E E 6.

[Josh Clark]

Okay.

[Chuck Bryant]

And this was following up on the Kentucky Meat Shower short stuff episode.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, good, good.

[Chuck Bryant]

I haven't listened yet because I'm on vacation, but I'm sure you mentioned it's coming up on the meat Showers anniversary, guys. And Bathco was supposedly reenacting this event. Crying, laughing emoji. This could be a fun way to do listener mail. Moving parts. I always geek out when you two talk about Kentucky. I've gone to your past four Seattle shows. My one question, if I had the chance, was always going to be, do you love Kentucky or are are we just really weird and worth talking about? A bit of both, I'm sure. And AJ Gree 6 I'm now remembering, we've done a few Kentucky based episodes, now that I think about it.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. Remember the Beverly Hills supper Club fire in Northern Kentucky.

[Sponsor/Ad Voice]

Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

And the blue people. Right.

[Josh Clark]

Were they out of Kentucky? You're right. You're right.

[Chuck Bryant]

I think it was Kentucky, wasn't it?

[Josh Clark]

Great memory. Sure. And how jackhammers worked. That was Kentucky. Kentucky heavy. Yeah, we probably.

[Chuck Bryant]

We had to mention Kentucky in our Thoroughbreds episode.

[Josh Clark]

Definitely. Man, we really have done a lot of Kentucky. Sorry, Iowa.

[Chuck Bryant]

We need to do a show in Kentucky. I've always wanted just Lexington or Louisville is the big question. So let us know.

[Josh Clark]

Okay. There you go. Well, who Was that again? RJ Grease 6.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, something like that.

[Josh Clark]

Thanks a lot, RJ. Grease 6. Or something like that. We appreciate you hanging out on our Instagram page. We have that Instagram page. I think we have a. We have a Facebook page too. We're on x bluesky. TikTok. We're even on TikTok. Chuck. Isn't that nuts?

[Chuck Bryant]

I did not even know that.

[Josh Clark]

I'm pretty sure we are shout out, by the way to Spencer, our social media friend who helps us big time with that stuff.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, I mean, we'll shout those guys out. If you're looking to hire someone to do your paid professional social media, you can do a lot worse than Hot Dog sandwich. Those guys are great.

[Josh Clark]

They are great and they're fun to work with and they just know what they're doing.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Super cool dudes.

[Josh Clark]

So, yeah, keep an eye out on our social media stuff for, I guess, some more things from us than you're probably used to. And then, you know, you can also, as always, contact us via [e-mail]

[Chuck Bryant]

Stuff youf Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts My Heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app. Apple Podcasts are wherever you listen to your favorite shows. This episode is brought to you by Audi. We all know that feeling a change of plans, a new opportunity. Instead of overthinking, what if you just said yes with the all new Audi Q3? The answer is easy. It's made for the yes life with the power and room to handle whatever pops up. Yes to adventure. Yes to right now. Because saying yes without hesitation, that's real luxury. The all new Audi Q3 made for the yes life. Learn more at audi USA.com Experience scenic

[Josh Clark]

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[Chuck Bryant]

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