[nemothekid]

Maybe your folks don't watch as much broadcast television as you'd imagine. My parents (over 50) know what Uber is given

- The amount of name drops the service gets on late night TV (Conan, SNL)

- The news it generates (medallions, the france protests)

- The viral facebook posts that go around when someone spends $300+ on an uber ride to go home.

Despite the fact they live in a suburb.

In any case, if we used your stringent definition of "household name", I doubt companies like Samsung, Sony or Twitter would fit the bill despite having massive consumer reach (and marketing spends).