March 12, 2005

Oh, How the Mighty Have Fallen!

The decline of one of many great American institutions is chronicled here:

"The heresy began with 'Double Stuffed' Oreos. This simple-minded d-oh moment came when somebody thought, 'Hey, let's double the stuffing!' It did not matter to them that the perfect proportion of white cream stuffing had already been achieved. Nope, this is the DoublePattyWhopper school of marketing drool: 'If one is good, two is twice as good.' Actually, if one is good, two in the same bun or cookie wafers is a bloody mess. And in addition, in order to get the double stuffing working correctly, they've upped the glue in the stuffing. No double stuffed Oreo comes apart neatly and cleanly. It always shatters. The pleasure of the original Oreo was that you could take it apart and have a chocolate wafer option. A bittersweet chocolate wafer option. Now even the wafer's been made sweet"

It's not just the decline of brands -- it's called market segmentation. Do we really need several kinds of Campbell's Cream of Mushroom Soup?

Apparently the marketers think so.

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