With the legal cloud lifting and music as the only certainty in his career, marketing experts tell Michael Jackson: : Don’t Quit Your Day Job

This summer, Michael Jackson’s lucrative celebrity endorsement career went down the drain in more ways than one.

About 200,000 bottles of a Michael Jackson fragrance had to be destroyed because few retailers wanted them on their shelves amid the lengthy investigation into child molestation allegations against the performer. “It was somewhat of a fiasco,” said Paul Rogers, president of Spectrum Innovating Marketing, whose ill-fated effort to sell the Jackson fragrance began before the investigation became public.

Now, as the cloud of the 13-month probe clears with prosecutors declining to file charges, the armchair advice for Jackson from marketing and music executives is pretty basic: stick to music and forget fragrances and other tie-ins.

Industry executives believe that one strong album can put the singer back on top of the pop charts, and that he will remain an international concert draw. “I wish Michael was signed to my company,” said Warner Music USA Chief Operating Officer Doug Morris. “He’s a brilliant artist who has fans all over the world. (His next) record is going sell like crazy.”

But they are equally convinced that Jackson’s days as a top celebrity endorser--earning staggering sums such as an estimated $20 million from Pepsi--are over. The scandalous headlines, the nightly “Hard Copy” reports and the sick jokes around the office water cooler have taken such an extensive toll that Jackson right now is damaged goods among image-sensitive marketers, at least in the United States, knowledgeable executives say.

“You can never go back to never-never land,” said Spectrum’s Rogers. “Anyone that wants to use Michael Jackson to endorse a product would have to take a very, very deep look into what they are doing.”

No doubt his appeal to advertisers was probably waning anyway.

At 36 and recently married, the boyish, Peter Pan image that once enchanted sponsors has faded. In addition, ill-fated ventures such as a disastrous shoe deal with L.A. Gear that was briefly in litigation, had already made sponsors gun shy. Some marketing executives also believe that the public is tired of Jackson’s eccentricities.

“His persona has grown tired,” said marketing consultant Irma Zandl. “It was more understandable and appealing when he was younger. But when you turn around and realize he’s nearly 40, the appeal isn’t the same.”

Pepsi officials who signed lucrative deals with Jackson in the past could not be reached, but have previously indicated that future deals with Jackson are unlikely.

Executives say that image-sensitive marketers will be especially reluctant to risk getting involved with Jackson because he has not been formally exonerated.

Prosecutors on Wednesday suggested that the investigation could be reopened if the boy who made the initial allegations decides to testify. In addition, prosecutors said the investigation uncovered two more children who claimed Jackson molested them, but who also did not want to testify. Regardless of the lack of charges, such news is likely to make parents reluctant to buy Jackson-endorsed products, executives said.

“You can never say never, but I would think any company with exposure to kids probably would want to steer well clear of him,” Zandl said.

She joked that the only potential sponsor she can think of is “No Excuses,” the jeans maker famous for ad campaigns involving such media-scorched figures as Donna Rice and Marla Maples.

Jackson’s extensive charity work could help him rebuild his image, as could his recent marriage to Lisa Marie Presley, the daughter of Elvis Presley.

The marriage has rekindled the public’s fascination with his life. Since his marriage to Presley, Jackson has made a point of returning to the public eye.

And, Jackson’s career as a recording artist has suffered little since the controversy broke last summer, especially overseas.

His “Dangerous” album, which sold 6 million copies in the United States, even spawned a hit single (“Will You Be There”) during the middle of the crisis. The album sold an additional 14 million copies overseas, where market analysts say fans have voiced little concern over the sexual molestation case.

Jackson’s popularity will be tested in December, when Sony’s Epic Records releases “History: His Story,” a 30-track, greatest-hits collection with eight new songs.

Industry analysts and executives at two of the nation’s largest retail record chains said they expect the album to be another blockbuster.

Epic Records President Richard Griffith--breaking Sony Music’s one-year silence on the Jackson controversy--agrees that Jackson’s music career remains solid.

“We’ve done a lot of marketing research since this thing broke last summer and what we found was that once the hysteria subsided all his fans really cared about was the music,” Griffith said. “What the research shows is that if Michael makes great music, his fans will buy it. And as far as we’re concerned, it’s onward and upward into the next phase of Michael’s career.”

“It’s ironic, but all the charges and the suspicion seem to have actually sparked interest in Michael’s new work,” said Pat Welsh, vice president of music programming at the Pollack Media Group, a prominent international consulting firm for radio and film.

Jackson is expected to hit the concert trail in February, marking his return to the stage for the first time since scrapping his worldwide “Dangerous Tour” last November after saying he needed treatment for an addiction to a painkiller.

No dates have been booked, but the tour will start with a string of arena shows in the United States and is is likely to include a European leg as well.

“The controversy has done nothing to tarnish Michael Jackson’s drawing power on the concert circuit,” said Gary Bongiovanni, editor of Pollstar magazine, a leading trade journal in the concert industry. “Promoters are lined up to work with him and fans can’t wait to see him perform.”

Jackson’s Music Career

While Michael Jackson’s more recent albums haven’t come close in sales to “Thriller,” he remains one of the top-selling artists of all time.

Worldwide sales for Michael Jackson’s last four albums, in millions of units:

“Off the Wall” (1979): 10 “Thriller” (1982): 41 “Bad” (1987): 20 “Dangerous” (1991): 21

Artists with the most No. 1 hits between 1955-1992: The Beatles: 20 Elvis Presley: 18 The Supremes: 12 Michael Jackson: 11 Stevie Wonder: 10 Paul McCartney / Wings: 9 Bee Gees: 9 George Michael / Wham!: 9 The Rolling Stones: 8 Madonna: 8 Whitney Houston: 8

Sources: Epic, Billboard

Researched by ADAM S. BAUMAN / Los Angeles Times *

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