Ten 80s and 90s TV Commercials For Businesses in Maine

As much as I watched TV as a kid, there were a lot of commercials from the 80s and 90s that left an impression on me. Funtown U.S.A., The Taste of Maine Restaurant, and Dimillo's Restaurant with their "halftime specials," all come to mind. But those are businesses that are still around 30 or 40 years later. What about the businesses that no longer exist?

Thanks to the YouTube Channel oldcommericalsUSA, we can take a trip back in time to see old TV ads for Maine businesses that no longer exist. A big thanks to whoever is behind this channel for hanging onto your old VHS tapes all these years.

La-Mére

La-Mére was an electronics store in Biddeford that like so many others including Radio Shack, couldn't survive with the big box stores opening up shop in Maine.

G.M. Pollack and Sons

For 60 years G.M. Pollack and Sons Jewelers had stores across the state, but in 2015 went out of business. Stan Pollack was the spokesperson for his family jewelry store on radio and TV.

Cablevision

Cablevision was the precursor to Time Warner Cable which was the precursor to Spectrum. They had no streaming or high definition, but they had a scrolling TV guide you could be mesmerized by.

LaVerdiere's Drug Stores

LaVerdiere's was a Maine drug store chain with locations all across Maine until they were bought out by Rite Aid in 1994. They were the hometown drug store for Mainers and were one of the first businesses in the state to open up a video game arcade in their stores where I dropped a lot of quarters into Pac-Man.

Brooks Pharmacy

Brooks Pharmacy was a national chain competitor to LaVerdiere's and was the pharmacy brand used at many small-town, locally owned pharmacies throughout New England.

La Z Boy Showcase Shoppe

The La Z Boy Showcase Shoppe was on Maine Mall Road, in a building that is still vacant next to DSW.

People's Heritage Bank

Like so many banks in Maine, People's Heritage merged with a handful of banks becoming TD Bank.

G-98 FM

G-98 was the name of the Top 40 radio station in Portland that was on-air from 1987 to 1991. Technically the station still exists today, but you've known it as Q97.9 since 1996.

Brown Pontiac

Brown Pontiac was a car dealership on the Saco Auto Mile, named after the stretch of road on Route 1 in Saco with a dozen car dealerships. GM dropped the Pontiac brand in 2010, likely contributing to the dealership's closure. Today the building is the home of Whited Peterbilt of Maine.

Andover College

Andover College began as Andover Institute of Business in Portland in 1967 and was changed to Andover College in 1977. It was bought by the Kaplan Higher Education Corporation in 2005[ and its name changed to Kaplan University.