David Melville has worked with the Renys jingle and logo since they were conceived in the late 1990s. Brianna Soukup/Portland Press Herald

WESTBROOK — The Renys jingle, with just four words, five notes and seven syllables, has been sung on radio and television every day in Maine since February 2011 — that’s more than 5,110 consecutive days.

Go ahead, hum it to yourself or better yet, sing it: “Renys, a Maine Adventure.”

Catchy, memorable and reflective of the brand, the jingle has what many agencies would describe as the key qualities of an effective advertisement. But the catchphrase for Maine’s famed department store chain was not developed around a conference table by a team of marketing experts in Chicago or New York City.

According to David Melville, the founder of Dirigo Marketing, the words and logo were made up by Mary Kate Reny, who is married to Bob Reny — the middle son of founder R.H. Reny.

“She didn’t have help from an agency, she didn’t have a table full of people batting ideas around,” Melville said. “She came up with it, scribbled on a napkin. … Nobody knew about it except the people that were close to it. And I said, I’m going to make this thing come to life.”

Renys employees carry comforter sets while moving the contents of the former Pittsfield store to a new location in June 2023. Rich Abrahamson/Morning Sentinel

Green trees and four simple words. The melody Melville came up with uses only five notes: A, C, D, G and F. He says it was created purposely to make it easy for anyone to sing.

“You don’t have to have any talent,” Melville added. “You don’t have to have a musical ear at all. You just need enthusiasm.”

Melville was working at WCSH-TV in production and then in sales and was working on the Renys account. He founded Dirigo Marketing in 1999 and has continued to refine the Renys jingle and logo ever since.

Prior to its singing debut in 2011, the words “Renys, a Maine Adventure” were worked into ad copy as early as 2009. The Renys jingle has at least 300 unique recordings and 500 sung versions, according to Melville, who said with a smile that he has heard it “a billion times.”

It’s become so entrenched here anyone can go to the Renys website and upload a recording of the jingle and it may end up on television or radio.

Scroll through the list of videos on YouTube or a search engine and you’ll find a lot of customers singing the four-second jingle: a lot of kids, schools, senior groups, John Reny, chamber singers, fire departments, James with bagpipes and a kilt, yoga groups, pickleball groups and more.

The Deaf community has recorded three unique versions using sign language.

A handful of Maine musicians have been persuaded to record the jingle with some adding their own touch. They include Chuck Romanov of Schooner Fare; Don Campbell; Denny Breau, brother of famous guitarist Lenny Breau (who was born in Auburn); and Mike Burd, who played with the Dave Mallett Band.

Melville says they’re still working on Patrick Dempsey, and Julia Gagnon is now on his list, but he insists Renys is more about the regular customers.

“Star power is nice,” Melville insisted, “but our secret sauce is people who don’t have star power.”

Other Maine companies have successfully used jingles over the years. The defunct LaVerdiere’s Super Drug Stores used the tagline “the people pleasers” in the 1980s and Marden’s has its jingle, “I should have bought it when I saw it at Marden’s,” also from the 1980s and 1990s.

Melville has two favorite versions of the jingle. One is by a toddler named Evelyn. 

“We were out at Brunswick Naval Air Station (for a production) and she was not cooperating,” Melville remembers, worried they had lost a half day for nothing. “But her parents really wanted to do it. And then all of a sudden, she just came to life.”

In stark contrast, his favorite musically produced version is the University of Southern Maine School of Music performing “O Fortuna Renys” at the Merrill Auditorium in 2014.

Melville said none of this would have been possible without the man he calls a master editor, Roy Clark, who runs a production studio in Windham. Melville said Clark has edited thousands of the ads and has helped conceive ideas for what he calls the magic of the jingle.

“Every version that hits the air has his touches on it,” Melville said.

Roy Clark of Pine Point Creative has edited thousands of Renys jingle spots. David Melville of Dirigo Marketing calls Clark a master editor. Submitted photo

Clark had a hand in recording Lewiston Mayor Carl Sheline singing the Renys jingle in September 2022 — the same day he recorded a collection of workers from the Dempsey Center. Why would the mayor of Lewiston, which is the second largest city in Maine but has no Renys store, sing for the camera?

“I was walking around as they were setting up for the Dempsey Challenge and Renys was there taking some video,” Sheline explained in an email. “When they found out I was the mayor they asked if I would record the jingle, and so I did. I remember John Reny saying afterwards, ‘It wasn’t the best, but it wasn’t the worst.’”