Happy birthday: General Mills’ Trix Rabbit turns 60

Trix is a brand of breakfast cereal made by General Mills for the North American market and by Cereal Partners (using the Nestlé brand) elsewhere in the world.

The fruit-flavored corn cereal was introduced in 1954, originally in three colors: Orangey Orange, Lemony Yellow and Raspberry Red.

Further shapes and colors were added – and subtracted – over the years, including Grapity Purple, Lime Green, Wildberry Blue, Berry Blue and Watermelon.

In 2015, General Mills announced it would no longer use artificial colors in its cereals – with a new healthier Trix cereal to be among the first to change.

Trix went from six colors to four after satisfactory natural alternatives were found for orange, yellow, red and purple, but not blue or green

However, due to consumer demand, the cereal giant reintroduced its artificial dye and flavour version in 2017.

Trickster

The Trix rabbit – created by Joe Harris, a copywriter and illustrator at the Dancer Fitzgerald Sample advertising agency – debuted in a 1959 television commercial.

Tricks — voiced by Mort Marshall, and later by Bret Iwan — is a cartoon rabbit who is always denied a bowl of cereal, so tries his best to trick children into giving him one.

He would invariably be discovered, and kids would reprimand him with the signature phrase “Silly rabbit! Trix are for kids,” also coined by Harris and still used in General Mills’ commercial campaigns.

However, he has succeeded in eating Trix cereal five times, thanks to overwhelming ‘yes’ votes by kids.

After a nationwide search in 2015 to launch the ‘healthier’ Trix cereal, the company introduced a real rabbit called Cinnabunbun as the official honorary Real Trix Rabbit.

Tricks has also appeared in commercials for other products, such as a Got Milk? ad, in which he disguises himself as a man taking Trix from a grocery store.

The Trix trademark is also used by Yoplait for a line of yogurt in sweetened fruit flavors, such as Watermelon Burst, marketed toward children.