Grumpy Cat: The First Meme Celebrity (2012)

In September 2012, a Reddit user posted a photo of his sister’s cat Tardar Sauce, whose feline dwarfism and underbite gave her a permanently scowling expression. The photo hit the front page of Reddit in hours. Within days, Tardar Sauce — rechristened “Grumpy Cat” — was on every late-night show, magazine cover, and T-shirt.

Grumpy Cat became a brand. She appeared in a Lifetime holiday movie, had her own coffee line (Grumppuccino), got a wax figure at Madame Tussauds, and reportedly earned her owner close to $100 million before her death in 2019. Grumpy Cat proved that memes could be monetized into traditional celebrity. She was the first influencer cat — and the template for every animal internet star that followed.