About a century, actually. Marketing began in the US after WWII WWI when we suddenly had the ability to create more products than people needed. People needed to be convinced to buy shit they didn’t need, and thus marketing was invented.

The first notable marketing campaign was cigarettes for ladies in 1929. Cigarette companies were missing a whole section of consumers because women weren’t supposed to smoke, especially in public. A group of beautiful young models were hired to smoke cigarettes at a big important parade that was going to get lots of coverage in the newspaper. A reporter was paid to “report” on their “carefree” and “liberated” manner as they smoked “torches of freedom” out at the festivities. Equality, feminism, yay!

Associating male virility with vehicle choice was next. Both were brain children of Sigmund Freud’s nephew, Edward Bernays, who was very interested in his uncle’s ideas about people’s actions being influenced by their subconscious mind, before it was popular in America.

This is a four hour documentary about the social manipulation of the last century, including the above, getting young progressives to vote for Regan in the 80s and much more. Century of the Self (BBC 2002)