During the 1970’s thru the 1990’s, Jon Byk Advertising created numerous 10 second TV spots, many of them for local Los Angeles businesses. Thanks to their short length, 10 second spots were effective as they could played hundreds of times during the programming day, sometimes saturating a specific hour-long show to the point of infuriating the viewer. Yet the message the commercial delivered got lodged in your head and thus achieved its aim. Now, one of my favorite childhood memories is of driving around with my mom while listening to KJOI–99 FM. KJOI was pure elevator music and I loved it. And frequently the destination of those drives was one of my favorite junk food spots ‘Pup ‘N Taco’, a long-defunct L.A. chain. Both companies benefited from the 10 second over-saturation of their Jon Byk produced spots and the ads are certainly the reason I knew of both the radio station and the burger joint and urged both upon my mom. I’ve posted the KJOI spot above and the Pup ‘N Taco below. I’m always surprised at how an old commercial can perform a sense-memory on me, fully taking me back in time so that I can taste the french fries and hear the string-section laden arrangements of pop tunes of the day. It turns out that the Byk family still runs the advertising agency and has a Youtube channel with a large variety of their vintage commercials. Click here to waste some time on it. You’ll be glad that you did.