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Updated: November 16, 2021 @ 10:25 am
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Of course I like bacon. I’m a guy. I live in the United States.
“Me need bacon,” every guy has said at some point in his best caveman tone.
But it really is time to move past the bacon flavor/scent mania.
Somewhere along the line, bacon became not just a food but a seasoning.
Arby’s just teamed up with a distiller to produce Arby’s Bacon Vodka. Sure, it will draw some chuckles from friends if you have it in your liquor case, but you already know it’s nothing you’d actually want to drink. Don’t buy it. Doing so will only encourage them and others to keep doing this stuff.
Hormel knows people like to wrap bacon around jalapenos and asparagus so they just came out with bacon-scented gift wrapping paper for the holidays.
They’re giving the wrap away in an online contest. Won’t the little ones be excited as they race to the tree on Christmas morning: “Daddy, why does Santa’s present stink like bacon?”
At least Hormel is tying their marketing schtick to a charitable event, giving $1 for every entry, up to $10,000, to the Salvation Army.
The list of bacon scented/flavored stuff is painfully long: bacon-flavored massage oil, chocolate, shakes, cookies, soda pop, Pringles, beans, tea, coffee and lollipops — just to name a very few.
Businessweek reports on the Dark Times of bacon — the 1980s and 1990s, when concerns over fat and nitrates hit the pork sector hard.
Bacon began to rebound soon after, when the Atkins Diet became popular. It sounded like a dieter’s dream — eat all the meat protein and eggs you want but forget the carbohydrates.
But after about a week, people realized they were having constant daydreams about being able to eat some bread, pasta and potatoes.
Still, the once profitable pork belly was still nearly worthless for the pork industry.
While many food trends start with famous chefs and restaurants tinkering in their kitchens, the staggering ascent of bacon was fueled purely by the pork industry’s marketers.
Particularly, Joe “Bacon Belly” Leathers did yeoman’s work in increasing bacon demand. He grew up in southern Minnesota, working in the Hormel pork-processing plant in Austin.
He later became a potent marketer, convincing restaurants to embrace bacon in recipes, kick-starting the bacon trend.
The pork industry began “subsidizing” recipe and market development for restaurants. Some called that a bribe to help get the public to stop fretting about fat intake and enjoy bacon flavor. But all is fair in love and marketing and it worked like a charm.
Today Americans spend $5 billion each year on bacon, with the average American eating 18 pounds of it annually.
There have over the years been plenty of predictions about the impending death of bacon mania, but you should never bet against our love affair with fat, flavor and meat.
Even higher prices don’t put a dent in bacon demand and that will continue.
But can we at least stop with bacon scents and flavors that aren’t actually contained in bacon?
We’re supposed to be a civilized society. Do we really need any more bacon-flavored cotton candy or toothpaste?
Tim Krohn can be contacted at [email protected] or 507-344-6383.
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