You really know your brand name is totally proliferated when any similar product is referred to by the general populace by your trademark. For instance, on my last day at the coffee shop my co-worker Sara asked me for the Windex. Now, we’ve never had Windex for the entirety of my time there, and we didn’t have it that day either. What we did have was bluish-green glass and surface cleanser in a squirt bottle, which basically equates to Windex. I got it for her without missing a beat, and didn’t even think about it until later.
My personal favourite example of this phenomenon is in tampons. When i was growing up the only brand of tampons ever to be seen in my house were Tampax tampons, and to this day i honestly don’t know that i could name any other brands. In conversation, i refer to singular “tampon” as “tampon,” and small groups of “tampons” as “tampons,” but any significant grouping or package of tampons is referred to as Tampax – because that’s the only way i ever knew them growing up.
Wow… now there’s a story about condoms and about tampons on the main page at the same time. Search engines are gonna love me….