Sale of the Century/Sale In Popular Culture

Brief footage from an episode of Sale of the Century did appears in the 1986 music video "Welcome to the Boomtown" by the music group David & David. There is no certainty if footage was from the NBC or syndicated run, but it definitely aired no earlier than May 1984 because Version 2.0 of the contestant podiums, which first appeared in May 1984 were prevalent. The footage can be seen at about 1:49 in the video, and it appears the footage is from about the start of the match; plus, two of the contestants' name are Steve and Sarah. It is possible that such footage was from Ep. S-114, originally aired on October 3, 1985 - about one year before the music video was released. ADDITIONAL NOTE: There was also a brief footage of The Price is Right during the showcase segment.

The glass money briefcase use to represent the cash jackpot or $50,000 was also used on Sale of the Century's sister show Scrabble during the finale of its 1985 Tournament of Champions.

In the 1985 episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents called "Night Caller", an episode of Sale of the Century can be briefly seen as it plays on Betsy Van Kennon's (played by Linda Fiorentino) TV.

In the 1988 American road-comedy drama film Rain Man, when Charlie Babbitt (played by Tom Cruise) along with his girlfriend Susanna (played by Valeria Golino) were coming in the room full of disabled people, a clip of Sale of the Century can briefly be seen on TV. ADDITIONAL NOTE: There was also scenes featuring clips from Wheel of Fortune, Pyramid & Jeopardy! as well.

In 1991, an episode of Studs features former host Jim Perry introducing Mark DeCarlo during the opening credits, DeCarlo was former contestant on Perry's version of Sale in 1985.

In 2001, TV Guide ranked Sale of the Century #41 as one of The 50 Greatest Game Shows of All-Time. Prior to this, the show was also mentioned of "The 60 Greatest Game Shows of All-Time" (in alphabetical order) in 2013.

In 2006, GSN ranked Sale of the Century#34 as one of The 50 Greatest Game Shows of All Time. The special was hosted by Bil Dwyer. Interestingly enough, Sale (80s version) had not been on the GSN schedule (save for a few clips in a GSN special) until March 2013, when the network announced their acquisition of 65 episodes from the 1988-89 (final) season, which began airing on April 1. The 1985-86 syndicated version of Sale began airing on the network in November. Those episodes aired on GSN until March 2015, when the network dropped the show from the schedule. Buzzr later started broadcasting reruns from the 1985-86 syndicated version in September 2015.