An advertising icon is up for sale: Lil' Penny.
A production puppet, which was a miniature version of Orlando Magic guard Penny Hardaway and the centerpiece of a Nike ad campaign in the 1990s, is being auctioned off at Heritage Auctions.
Three decades ago, as Nike dealt with Bo Jackson leaving football and baseball and Michael Jordan's first NBA retirement, the shoe company needed a spark. Doing something with Hardaway's new $180 shoe hitting the market made sense.
When the guard signed with Nike out of Memphis State, the shoe and apparel company said it would make Hardaway the second Nike basketball star, after Jordan, to have a shoe named after him.
In the mid- to late-1990s, Hardaway starred in the Nike advertising campaign "Lil Penny," featuring the alter ego puppet and voiced by comedian Chris Rock.
Stacy Wall, former creative director of Weiden + Kennedy, had the idea.
The concept was to make a bolder version of Hardaway in a “1/2" jersey and make ads around his life, which featured his girlfriend, Tyra Banks, who graced the cover of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue in 1996.
"It struck me that the puppet could become his alter ego, but I didn’t want it to suffer the creep factor, so I made sure it was very comedic," Wall told Complex in 2016. "He’ll be everything Penny is not in terms of his personality: He’ll be full of ego. He’ll be brash. He’ll be funny. He’ll be unafraid to say Penny is the best."
The ad became so popular, a company called Playmate Toys made a 12-inch Lil Penny figurine for kids, and there was a "tell-all" book, which he promoted on the "Oprah Winfrey Show."
Even Hardaway himself said he was surprised at how long the campaign lasted, as the puppet was featured in at least 15 commercial spots and starred in his own Super Bowl commercial in 1997.
The puppet up for auction is one of several that was used for the shooting of the spots and among a handful made by M5 Industries. The lot comes with a letter from the puppeteer, asserting he got the item as a gift.
Including buyer's premium, the puppet stands at $31,750 as of Thursday morning, already surpassing the $30,000 estimate with 16 days still to go.
Darren Rovell is the founder of cllct and one of the country's leading reporters on the collectibles market. He previously worked for ESPN, CNBC and The Action Network.