Remember Tazos? The cartoon-covered plastic discs arrived in Australia in 1995 and quickly became our favourite childhood game – but where did they come from?
ICYMI, or you weren’t born yet, Tazos were essentially a marketing tool to get big names like Looney Tunes, The Simpsons, Beyblades, Star Wars and even Smith’s chips in front of kids – and it worked.
Tazos were found in cereal boxes and chip packets and for avid fans, they became part of prized collections, sealed away in Tazo albums and plastic folders to collect dust in the years to come.
The game was played by stacking Tazos then throwing a Slammer at the pile. The player would collect all the discs that landed face up and the game would continue. Whoever ended up with the most discs was the winner.
In a recent interview with Vice, Tazos founder Pedro Padierna explained how the idea came about. Apparently, Padierna and his co-worker Fabian de la Paz caught wind of a Hawaiian beverage company who, in the 1930s, made their bottle caps collectable by covering them in artwork and calling them ‘POGs.’ Like Tazos, POGs eventually became a popular game that dominated the playground for years.
Fast-forward to the 90s and the guys behind POGs were ready to bring them back and licence the campaign to other brands. Fabian de la Paz found them at a promotions expo in the US and the rest is history.
What is truly mind-blowing about the whole thing is not only the fact that Tazos came from POGs, but that the term ‘POG’ was originally an acronym for pineapple, orange, and guava. The name Tazo came from an advertising agency and was derived from ‘taconazos,’ which is Spanish for “the heel of a shoe.” Apparently, this was a cheeky nod to another Mexican schoolyard game that involved using shoe heels to remove bottle caps. Yes – this year’s bottle cap challenge is quaking right now.
According to Vice, PepsiCo eventually made Tazos a global phenomenon which is when the popular 90s game landed on Aussie shores.
For the 90s kids out there who still have their Tazo collection – guard that puppy with your life, it’s an icon that deserves all the respect.