Stride gum has so many uses, it needs its very own infomercial

If you're trying to sell gum, an infomercial sounds like overkill. You don't really have to demonstrate its uses or anything, right? Wrong. This three-minute ad for Stride Gum from JWT shows various alternatives to just chewing the stuff, including using it as a "tiny one-way boomerang" or as fake eyebrows. (Such uses come in handy, you see, because Stride is said to never lose its flavor. No need to buy a second pack.) The ad could pass for a real infomercial with its voluble Married With Children-like crowd and special guests, including a "world-famous scientist" and a "paid actor." For now, it's only running online. But JWT creative director Jackie Hathiramani says the agency hopes to get it on TV, preferably late at night. Says Hathiramani: "In hard times, you have to have a hard sell."

—Posted by Todd Wasserman