Merrick here...

Iconinc TV pitchman Billy Mays passed away this weekend; he was 50. Mays was best known for high energy info-hocks of products usually priced at $19.99 or less.

Many people know Billy only from his assertive, often grating advertising appearances. But the Discovery Channel's television series PITCHMEN, not surprisingly, Mays to have been so much more.

Mays worked very hard, for many years, to find success - and felt he only truly "made it" around the age of 40 (roughly ten years ago). Over the past few years he'd reconnected with a semi-estranged son and even given him a bit of work (if I understand the story correctly). Mays championed affordable health care for those who could not pay high premiums. He was a family man with a three year old daughter and a 20-something year old stepson.

Discovery & Discovery HD are broadcasting a marathon of PITCHMEN on July 1 (Wednesday) - HERE is a list of air times. It's a surprisingly interesting look into May's "direct response marketing" techniques - the struggles to get the price tags of certain items to the magic $20 or less range, the payoffs of doing so, how the success of Mays-pitched products impacts the lives of their inventors - and an illuminating insight into a man who...in many ways...we were just getting to know.

Check it out.

NBC has thoughtfully provided Billy's recent appearance on Conan O'Brien's TONIGHT SHOW (with business partner Anthony Sullivan). You can view this as an embed here:

Peace, Billy.

Please, let's try not dilute memories of Billy in this Talkback by hammering AICN about failing to note Ed McMahon's passing last week. The omission was a failure on our part, pure and simple. We fucked up.