Editing Marmite (section)

== Marketing ==
{{Quote box
| quote = "I remember sitting in my office looking at the brief and saying to Richard [Flintham], 'I fucking hate Marmite.' And he said 'Oh, I love it.' And we both just looked at each other."
| width = 20%
| author = Andy McLeod of marketing agency [[DDB Worldwide|BMP DDB]] on the creation of the "Love it or Hate it" campaign<ref>{{Cite news|last=House|first=Arthur|date=2021-06-17|title=Marketing Marmite: how an advertising agency started a culture war|work=[[1843 (magazine)|1843]]|url=https://www.economist.com/1843/2021/06/17/marketing-marmite-how-an-advertising-agency-started-a-culture-war|access-date=2021-06-27|issn=0013-0613}}</ref>
}}
Marmite's publicity campaigns initially emphasised the spread's healthy nature, extolling it as "The growing up spread you never grow out of". The first major Marmite advertising campaign began during the 1930s, with characters whose faces incorporated the word "good". Soon afterwards, the increasing awareness of vitamins was used in Marmite advertising, with slogans proclaiming that "A small quantity added to the daily diet will ensure you and your family are taking sufficient vitamin B to keep nerves, brain, and digestion in proper working order".

During the 1980s, the spread was advertised with the slogan "My mate, Marmite", chanted in television commercials by an army platoon. The spread had been a standard vitamin supplement for British-based German [[Prisoner of war|POW]]s during the Second World War. For many years television advertisements for Marmite featured the song "[[Low Rider]]" by the band [[War (U.S. band)|War]] with the lyrics changed to the phrase "My Mate, Marmite".

===Love/hate polarisation===
By the 1990s Marmite's distinctive and powerful flavour had earned it as many detractors as it had fans, and it was known for producing a polarised "love/hate" reaction amongst consumers. Marmite began a "Love it or Hate it" campaign in October 1996, and this resulted in the inventing of the phrase "Marmite effect" or "Marmite reaction" for anything which provoked controversy.<ref>[[Cath Kidston]], appearing on [[BBC Radio 4]]'s ''[[Desert Island Discs]]'' programme in April 2010 described her shops as provoking a 'Marmite reaction': "People either love it and want a little bit of it very much, or want to stab us." {{cite web |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b010lyy4/Desert_Island_Discs_Cath_Kidston/ |title=Desert Island Discs: Cath Kidston |date=29 April 2010 |website=BBC |access-date=29 April 2011}}</ref> On 22 April 2010, Unilever threatened legal action against the [[British National Party]] for using a jar of Marmite and the "love it or hate it" slogan in a [[party political broadcast]].<ref>{{cite news |title=BNP facing Marmite legal action |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/election_2010/8637473.stm |access-date=22 April 2010 |website=BBC News |date=22 April 2010}}</ref>