It’s by now a well-worn trope that since the broad adoption of cell phones, no one remembers phone numbers anymore. The one big exception to this, however, are phone numbers designed for easy recall: vanity numbers.
You see them on billboards and TV. You hear them repeatedly in catchy jingles and radio earworms. Usually they spell something, but sometimes they’ve just got a melody you can’t forget (or have repeating digits like “800-111-1111”).
With those in mind, here are ten of our favorite, nostalgic and notorious, memorable vanity phone numbers that have had a huge cultural impact. How many do you remember?
- 1-800-COLLECT
For a long time, AT&T had a first-mover advantage in American telephony, as the entity formerly known as the Bell Telephone Company (as in Alexander Graham Bell, inventor of the telephone). Even after US regulators broke up the company’s monopoly in the early 80s, up into the 90s they still dominated collect calling by way of people dialing 0. If you’re young enough to have never heard of collect calling, that’s when you can charge the call to the receiver instead of the caller, allowing someone to, for instance, make a call from a pay phone when they don’t have any money. (“What’s a payphone?” Ugh. Nevermind.)
In 1993, telecom rival MCI introduced 1-800-COLLECT, which substantially undercut AT&T’s rates and achieved universal recognition through an enormous ad campaign, including celebrity TV spots and some of the earliest internet advertisements. It’s still kicking around under new ownership, but at nowhere near its former glory, given the uptake of cell phones and near obsolescence of pay phones.
- 1-800-54-GIANT
Generations of New Englanders will know the answer to “who do you call when your windshield’s busted?” Not Ghostbusters, but Giant Glass. The Giant Glass jingle was everywhere across regional radio and television waves for over a decade after noted Boston-based jingle composer Andy Vallario penned it in 1989.
It even made its way into Stephen King’s 1999 novel The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon (King of course being noted for setting his books in Maine/New England and filling them with pop culture references). Safelite acquired Giant Glass in 2012, and so unfortunately this catchy regional classic has been subsumed by the also-memorable “Safelite repair, Safelite replace.”
- 1-877-CASH-NOW
Financial services company J.G. Wentworth, which specializes in offering upfront lump payments for people’s structured settlements or annuities, entered the jingle canon in 2008 with its award-winning opera-themed national TV spot offering “CASH NOW.” Apparently an individual contacted the company because he owned 877-CASH-NOW and thought it would be valuable to them. From an asking price of $1 million, they negotiated him down to $5,000, which frankly seems like he got kind of low-balled, given the success of the ad campaign.
The jingle was recently featured as a recurring bit in the 2024 final season of the HBO comedy Curb Your Enthusiasm, sealing its cultural notoriety. Tracy Ullman’s character, who is living with Larry David, sings the jingle compulsively, which drives Larry crazy. The show licensed the jingle from J.G. Wentworth, with everyone reportedly very happy with the arrangement.
- 1-877-KARS-4-KI(DS)
The other infamous phone number jingle that Larry David considered for Curb Your Enthusiasm featured the theme song for Kars 4 Kids, a non-profit organization that accepts car donations to fund educational and recreational activities for low-income, Jewish children and families. The simple, repetitive melody is sung by children, mostly just repeating the phone number.
Composed in the late 90s by a volunteer (to a melody from a song by Jewish artist Country Yossi), it launched on New York-area radio stations, but spread to other markets in the following years. It’s national notoriety blew up with the first television ad in 2014. Much like above with Curb Your Enthusiasm, the jingle was featured derisively in NBC sitcom The Good Place as the theme song sung by demons in the Bad Place.
- 1-800-588-2300 (Empire Today)
Not all phone numbers need to spell something to be memorable, as evidenced by the number for Chicago-based national carpet retailer, Empire Today. Surprisingly, the number and jingle, virtually unchanged, has been in continuous use since 1977, making it the oldest number on this list, and an unassailably classic jingle.
Fun fact to terrify or inspire copywriters everywhere, according to Empire Today’s own website, Empire Man originally appeared on TV as a role played by Lynn Hauldren, who “was not the company’s owner, or a sales representative or installer. Hauldren worked for the Empire brand as an advertising copywriter.” The company’s owner, during the time, requested he play the Empire Man role after unsuccessfully auditioning several other actors, essentially making him the “face” of the Empire brand.
- 1-800-MATTRES(S)
Founded as Dial-a-Mattress in 1976, they started to promote the iconic phone number in 1988 and changed the name of the company to match soon thereafter. The memorable jingle was actually also composed by Andy Vallario, of 1-800-54-GIANT fame.
Many vanity numbers will actually run over 7 digits for memorability if the word they are trying to spell is one or two letters longer, and just not call attention to the unnecessary dialing (such as with 1-877-KARS-4-KI(DS)). However, 1-800-Mattress cleverly embraced and pointed the discrepancy out with its slogan, “dial 1 800 M – A – T – T – R – E – S, and leave off the last ‘S’ for savings!”
- 1-900-909-JEFF
While 900 numbers plummeted with the rise of the internet, they are notorious for incurring high per-minute rates. Infamously associated with adult entertainment, that wasn’t their only affiliation.
Back in the day, enterprising individuals and companies could purchase a 900 number and offer recordings of pretty much, anything. From random information to clever stories, the longer the caller stayed on the line, the more money the operator made. The phone carrier charged the caller on their monthly bill and then both the phone carrier and the operator shared the revenue.
These numbers became quite lucrative for a couple of decades. In the 80s and early 90s one of many predatory 900 number trends involved advertising these numbers to children on TV commercials, offering services like talking to the Smurfs. Many Gen Xers have stories about racking up huge phone bills from these numbers, much to the ire of their parents. One weird and nostalgic example that captured the attention (and calls) of many 80s kids, entailed the Fresh Prince and DJ Jazzy Jeff rap hotline, advertised here in 1988, and offered a new recorded rap every day.
- 1-800-HURT-NOW
If you drive a car in the United States of America, you probably know at least one lawyer’s phone number, whether you mean to or not. Billboards advertising legal services, particularly for those injured in auto accidents, are a pervasive feature of the American landscape, let alone all the radio and infamously low-budget TV ads. 1-800-HURT-NOW connects to a national network of personal injury attorneys, and stands in for a whole category of similar numbers. Anything you can think of in seven letters that spells something like INJURED or GOT-HURT or LAWYERS will connect you to legal services. They consistently comprise a huge portion of the most valuable vanity numbers sold every year.
- 1-719-26-OATES
And another music-related number to call on this list commemorates a different legendary and iconic ensemble from the 1980s. “Callin’ Oates” is an automated service you can call to hear one from a selection of songs by 70s and 80s adult contemporary rock duo Hall and Oates, in case of an emergency.
Created in 2011 by an employee at communication company Twilio as a demonstration of their virtual business phone technology, it went viral and endured far longer than originally planned. Although the service was reportedly discontinued in early 2025, it appears currently to have been restored, perhaps due to public outrage.
- 867-5309
Perhaps the most iconic phone number of all time, made famous by Tommy Tutone in the song 867-5309/Jenny on their 1981 album Tommy Tutone 2. There are different accounts from band members as to whether the number came from a real person, or was just made up for its musical flow.
Infamously, a lot of people in area codes across the country did have that phone number IRL (in real life), and they faced a barrage of phone calls asking for “Jenny” when the song blew up in 1982. In the decades since, however, as Tommy Tutone mania has died down, the song has remained a beloved classic of the era. It has since gained a lot of cache as a valuable phone number, now with a long history of people either stumbling into it, seeking it out, or trying to use the attention for profit.
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