From an IMHO thread:
Today my google-fu is not mighty. Can anyone point me to a video of the classic commercial where a Bic pen (‘Stick’) is shot out of a gun at a target, and is shown to still be capable of writing? I have an idea that John Cameron Swayze was the pitchman.
I’m sorry. I thought for a moment this was Fark.
I think he pitched Timex watches, although confusion about who was the pitchman is understandable. Swayze’s Timex ads also showed Timexes being subjected to various stresses–I seem to recall one where a Timex was strapped to the propellor of an outboard motor: “Timex takes a licking and keeps on ticking,” was the tagline, IIRC.
I remember the rifle ad for Bic too. Couldn’t find it on YouTube, but I did find the one where the flamenco dancer has a Bic attached to his boot. After a vigorous dance, the Bic still writes. And it was still only 19 cents!
YouTube doesn’t seem to have them. They had several of these – They had a Bic pen being fired out of a rifle, through a block of wood, and working. They had one where it was attached, ballpoint down, to an ice skate, and a skater did a routine on the ice.
“Bic pen writes first time, every time. Even over butter!”
So how come I’ve got a zillion clogged-up Bic pens in all my pen holders? Maybe I need to shoot them through blocks of pine every now and then. Or grease them up with butter.
You gotta be rough with them! If you coddle them they only let you down.
When I was a kid, Bic pens had a slogan that I didn’t get at the time. I recently re-encountered it and laughed my head off.
Flic my Bic
No, that was the slogan for the Bic lighter. IIRC, it was one of the first cheap and widely-available disposable lighters. The slogan for Bic pens was as above: “Bic writes first time, every time.”
Yeah, I watched a lotta TV as a kid.
Well I still didn’t get it was a play up Suck My Dick.
That one didn’t go quite as planned.
One cartoon said, “Of course it didn’t work, sir. You don’t have any butter on the paper!”
I remember a popular song from that Bic/Timex period…
If I was a carpenter
and you were a lady
would you rather marry me
or John Cameron Swayze?
… or maybe I just dreamt it up.
I dunno, why do I have a Fisher Space Pen, that’s just as clogged up and smearing ink all over the place? 
Meh. Those are only good for getting you off the Moon.
No Bic pen commercial thread would be complete without mentioning this monster.