- Vanessa L. Facenda, Brandweek

NEW YORK Forget the cake. Betty Crocker is putting the icing on the cookie.

This month, the venerable desserts maker launches Decorating Cookie Icing. TV ads, which will air on most major holidays, debut this week.

Betty Crocker is touting the product as the first "easy-to-use" professional decorating icing. Typically, this form of hard icing, used for gingerbread houses and wedding cakes, has the wrong consistency for such small designs, said Kristi Bridges, creative director at The Sawtooth Group, Woodbridge, N.J., which handles the advertising.

The first TV ad breaks this week on ABC Family Network, Food Network, HGTV and Lifetime. Bridges said the 15-second spot is designed to promote cookie baking and decorating as a fun, bonding experience for the whole family.

The Easter spot features a mother with her son and daughter putting colorful designs on sugar cookies. The voiceover: "New Betty Crocker Decorating Cookie Icing. It's fun. It's easy, and most of all, it's delicious." the tagline: "Bake life sweeter." It will run through Easter.

New versions will be launched around the back-to-school period in late August, Halloween, Christmas and Valentine’s Day 2009. Depending on the success of the product, the campaign may expand, according to Bridges. The product began rolling out in February; retail price is around $2.99.

Signature Brands, Ocala, Fla., markets the new Betty Crocker Decorating Cookie Icing. Signature licenses the Betty Crocker name for a variety of baking items as well as Cake Mate decorating items and PAAS-branded products. General Mills, Minneapolis, owns the Betty Crocker brand.

Signature spent about $1.5 million in U.S. measured media in 2007, per Nielsen Monitor-Plus (not including online). General Mills spent $85 million behind the Betty Crocker brand.