The infomercial era was built on faces, not products. From the late 1970s through the 2010s, a small group of pitchmen turned 30-minute commercials and 2-minute spots into a multi-billion-dollar industry. They sold knives, juicers, blankets, and grills with a directness that traditional advertising never matched, and the best of them became household names. Below is our honest field guide to the legends who made late-night television impossible to look away from.
Why the Pitchmen Mattered
On-camera personalities outperformed generic narration because viewers buy from people they trust, and trust is built through eye contact, energy, and conviction. Direct-response television (DRTV) lives or dies on a single question: do you believe the person on screen actually uses this thing? The pitchmen profiled here all answered that question with a confident yes. They demonstrated, they shouted, they smiled, and they closed. For a deeper look at the format itself, see our pillar guide to what an infomercial is and how it differs from a standard commercial.
Ron Popeil: The Father of the Infomercial
Ron Popeil practically invented the modern pitchman archetype. Born May 3, 1935, Popeil founded Ronco in 1964 and spent six decades selling some of the most recognizable products in American television history: the Pocket Fisherman, the Veg-O-Matic, the Chop-O-Matic, the Inside-the-Shell Egg Scrambler, GLH Formula Number 9 Hair in a Can, and the Showtime Rotisserie and BBQ. He coined or popularized two of the most quoted lines in advertising: “But wait, there’s more!” and “Set it and forget it!” The latter debuted with the Showtime Rotisserie in the late 1990s and turned a countertop oven into a household phenomenon.
Popeil’s gift was structure. He wrote, directed, and starred in his own pitches, and he understood that a great demo answers objections before the viewer can voice them. He died July 28, 2021, at age 86. His catchphrases live on, and you can read more about them in our roundup of iconic infomercial catchphrases.
Billy Mays: The Bearded Loud One
If Popeil was the architect, Billy Mays was the rock star. William Darrell Mays Jr. was born July 20, 1958 in McKees Rocks, Pennsylvania, and learned his craft on the boardwalks of Atlantic City before moving to television. His uniform never changed: a blue button-down shirt, khakis, and a thick black beard. Neither did his volume. Every spot opened with the same line: “Hi, Billy Mays here!”
Mays became the on-camera face of OxiClean, OrangeGlo, Kaboom, Mighty Putty, Mighty Mendit, Hercules Hooks, Awesome Auger, and dozens more. His delivery was so loud that producers reportedly turned him down two or three decibels in the mix. He died June 28, 2009, at age 50, of hypertensive heart disease. He was working on a Discovery Channel show called Pitchmen at the time, and his death was a genuine cultural moment, the kind of thing that stops a Saturday morning cold.
Vince Offer (Vince Shlomi): ShamWow and Slap Chop
Vince Offer, born Offer Shlomi, brought a sharper, faster, almost stand-up-comedian energy to DRTV. ShamWow launched in the United States in the 2006 to 2007 era and Slap Chop followed shortly after, with a viral remix of his pitch that arguably did more for both products than the original commercials. His catchphrases (“You’ll be saying wow every time!” and the infamous “You’re gonna love my nuts!”) became internet inside jokes years before that was a category.
Offer had a public off-screen incident in 2009 that briefly took him off the air, and he returned with new spots and a feature film a few years later. He has continued to develop products and pitches, and he remains one of the most imitated voices in the format.
Anthony Sullivan: The British Voice of OxiClean and Swivel Sweeper
Anthony “Sully” Sullivan is the British market-stall pitchman who became one of America’s longest-running DRTV stars. He came up selling on the streets of Britain and Australia before moving to the United States, where he became the face of the Swivel Sweeper, the Smart Chopper, and a long list of other products. After Billy Mays died in 2009, Sullivan picked up several of the brands Mays had been associated with, including continued OxiClean spots. He co-starred with Mays on Discovery’s Pitchmen and has been a steady on-camera presence ever since.
Suzanne Somers: ThighMaster and a Wellness Empire
Suzanne Somers had a Hollywood career before infomercials, but the ThighMaster turned her into the most recognizable celebrity pitchwoman of the 1990s. The product launched in 1991 and reportedly sold more than 10 million units in its first decade. The pitch was brilliantly simple: a former sitcom star squeezing a piece of bent steel between her knees, telling viewers they could do the same on the couch. Somers later built an entire wellness, skincare, and lifestyle brand on the back of that visibility, and she was one of the first celebrities to fully understand that the infomercial format could be a launch pad rather than a payday.
Tony Robbins: Personal Power and the Self-Help Boom
Tony Robbins’ Personal Power infomercial debuted in 1988, and it changed what an infomercial could be. Robbins did not sell a kitchen gadget; he sold a cassette program and, more importantly, a worldview. The spot ran for years, made Robbins a household name, and arguably created the modern self-help category as a direct-response business. Personal Power proved that information products and intangible promises could work in the format if the on-camera presence was strong enough.
Tony Little: America’s Personal Trainer
Tony Little was the screaming, blond-ponytailed fitness pitchman whose face was inescapable on cable in the 1990s and 2000s. His best-known product was the Gazelle Edge, a low-impact glider, and he also sold the Rock and Roll Stepper and a long line of Target Training products. Little overcame a serious car accident early in his career, and his pitch leaned into that personal story in a way that gave his energy real backbone. Whatever you think of the products, he is the rare pitchman who has stayed on the air across four decades.
Mike Levey: Amazing Discoveries
Mike Levey hosted Amazing Discoveries from the late 1980s into the early 2000s and was the calm, casual antidote to Popeil and Mays. He wore loose chinos and a Hawaiian shirt, sat on a stool, and seemed almost unimpressed by the products he was demonstrating. That was the point. Levey gave viewers permission to enjoy the format without feeling shouted at. He died in 2003, but the show is fondly remembered as one of the most-watched infomercial vehicles of the late-cable era. For more from that period, see our list of 90s infomercials.
Cathy Mitchell: Dump Cake and the Big Country Cookbook
Cathy Mitchell is the homey, smiling kitchen pitchwoman behind Dump Meals, Dump Cake, the Big Country Cookbook, the Snackmaster, and the GT Xpress 101. Her style is the opposite of Mays or Offer: she invites you into a small, well-lit kitchen and gently shows you how easy the product is. Mitchell has been on television in some form since the early 1980s, and she is one of the most enduring pitch personalities in the cookbook and small-appliance category.
The Modern Pitchmen
The classic stable of personality-driven pitchmen has thinned out, but the format never went away. Modern DRTV leans more on celebrity endorsements and medical-style spokespeople than on a single recurring face, and many of today’s best-known infomercials are built around either a doctor figure, a former athlete, or a folksy founder. For examples of how the format works in the 2010s and 2020s, see our reviews of the Omega XL infomercial, the CarShield infomercial, and the Balance of Nature infomercial. Each of those campaigns shows how the playbook Popeil and Mays wrote still drives modern long-form advertising.
What Made a Great Pitchman
After studying hundreds of these spots, the same four traits show up again and again in the people who lasted:
- Energy. The best pitchmen treat a 90-second slot like a Broadway audition. Even Mike Levey, the calm one, was always fully present.
- Conviction. Viewers can tell within seconds whether the person on screen actually uses the product. Popeil cooked his rotisserie chicken on camera and ate it.
- Physical demonstration. A great pitch is a magic trick. Slice the tomato, lift the bowling ball with the Mighty Putty, vacuum up the cereal with the ShamWow. Show, do not just tell.
- Eye contact through the camera. The lens is one person, sitting on the couch at midnight. Popeil and Mays both spoke straight into it like a friend giving advice.
Pair those traits with a product that solves a clear, ugly little problem (a stained shirt, a clogged drain, a flabby thigh) and you have the formula that built the era. For the receipts, browse our roundup of the best infomercials of all time and our companion list of 80s infomercials that got the format off the ground.
Frequently Asked Questions
- Who is the most famous infomercial pitchman?
Billy Mays and Ron Popeil are the two most widely cited. Mays is the most recognizable face of the late 2000s thanks to his loud delivery and his association with OxiClean, while Popeil is the one most credited with inventing the modern infomercial template at Ronco from the 1960s through the 2000s. - How did Billy Mays die?
Billy Mays died on June 28, 2009, at age 50. The Hillsborough County medical examiner ruled the cause as hypertensive heart disease. - Who founded Ronco?
Ron Popeil founded Ronco in 1964. He sold many of the company’s products in his own infomercials for the next 50 years and remained the public face of the brand until shortly before his death in 2021. - Who replaced Billy Mays after he died?
Anthony Sullivan, who had co-starred with Mays on Discovery’s Pitchmen, took over several of the brands Mays had been associated with, including continued OxiClean spots. Other pitchmen, including Vince Offer and a rotating cast of newer faces, also picked up adjacent products. - Is Anthony Sullivan still doing infomercials?
Yes. Anthony Sullivan has continued to appear in DRTV spots and as a brand spokesperson into the 2020s, and he remains one of the longest-running on-camera pitchmen in the United States. - What was Ron Popeil’s most famous catchphrase?
Two phrases tied to Popeil have become advertising shorthand. ‘But wait, there’s more!’ predates him in some forms but he popularized it across decades of Ronco spots, and ‘Set it and forget it!’ was introduced with the Showtime Rotisserie and BBQ in the late 1990s. - Which pitchwoman sold the ThighMaster?
Suzanne Somers fronted the ThighMaster campaign starting in 1991. The product reportedly sold more than 10 million units in its first decade and became one of the most successful celebrity-driven infomercials ever made.