308. DAZ AND FAS : Two Lesser-Known Detergents of the Mid-60s

DAZZ gets clothes dazzling clean--saves you money too! 1965

Sometime in 1965, two laundry detergents were launched one after each other in the Philippines, both with one syllable-brand names, which also rhymes, and both price brands. DAZ was a Procter & Gamble project introduced in 1953 in the United Kingdom. It was aggressively promoted there, and over a decade later, was rolled out to the Philippines as Super DAZ, in the hope of replicating its success in the U.K. market. DAZ was sold on  the basis of its fast, cleaning power, at a price more economical than any laundry bar or powder. 

FAS, for the fastest cleaning power! 1966

Right on its heels was FAS, a locally manufactured laundry powder of the Philippine Detergents Products.  FAS claims to be the detergent with “the fastest cleaning power”, in a time where  supelatives were permitted without any substantive proof.

Both DAZ and FAS had print ads that looked suspiciously similar, one is wont to think that they were made to compete against each other. But no such fireworks happened, as DAZ failed to dazzle and FAS was fast to fade; both brands did not even survive the end of the 60s decade.