When you become a truly celebrated celebrity, it’s like hitting the jackpot in a continuous fashion. Forget the measly few millions made on recording contracts, movie roles and live touring, there are literally hundreds of millions to be made in the realm of advertising and lending your beloved face to a product. From clothes to shoes to fragrances, accessories…food and beverages…the list goes on. There are huge bucks to be made in the land of endorsement deals. Here are 11 examples of impressively high grossing celeb endorsement deals, and a few honorable mentions to go with them.
11. Justin Timberlake
Justin Timberlake has been doing it well since his days as a Mouseketeer. We’ll state it factually: Justin tries too hard to be funny during interviews–too many jokes that would only make his grandmother laugh–still, you can’t deny his seemingly unending charm. Everyone seems to love Justin, regardless of race, religion or subcultural background. If you don’t like him as a singer, you probably like him as an actor. If you’re McDonald’s brass (in 2003), and your image is hurting, because people are starting to understand that McDonald’s food was less than, shall we say, high-quality, of course you’d go after a Timberlake. Justin scored $6 million to record “I’m Lovin’ It,” as a one time buy out. Six. Million. One song. One video. Justin later admitted to regretting the choice. We can imagine why. Though he couldn’t argue with the results: McDonald’s market shares jumped by 25 percent.