Tuesday, February 6, 2018

NO ONE WANTS LADY DORITOS!

If you haven't heard the disgustingly sexist comments from PepsiCo's CEO Indra Nooyi regarding making special Doritos for Women, check out The New York Times' re-cap of what went down.

I have a few thoughts about this...“They don’t like to crunch too loudly in public,” she said. “And they don’t lick their fingers generously, and they don’t like to pour the little broken pieces and the flavor into their mouth.” and added “how can you put it in a purse? Because women love to carry a snack in their purse.”  Number 1, MADAM, who doesn't want a crunchy chip?? A chip with no crunch is called a Potato! That's the opposite of what you sell! A Dorito with less crunch? That's a Tortilla! Women don't want less crunch, they want to live in a world where they are free to crunch as loud as they fucking want without old ladies like Mrs. Nooyi giving them shit for it. Number 2, we LOVE to lick our fingers, that's literally the best part! Concentrated flavor! A treat at the end of your snack. The reason Adult Women don't lick our fingers in public is A) that's gross and B) we are sexualized for doing it in public. But we LOVE to do that shit in the privacy of our own homes, cars, and cubicles. Sucking the flavor out from under our acrylics is more satisfying then you can ever understand! And honestly, if we really don't want to do it in a public setting, we aren't barbarians, we are fully capable of wiping our hands on a napkin, or getting up to, you know, WASH OUR HANDS! Number 3, show me the Woman who doesn't pour the crumbs in her mouth? Who is she?? I never met her and MA'AM I believe you made that bullshit up. Real talk, look at Mrs. Nooyi, does she strike you as a woman who has ever eaten a bag of Doritos? Not at all. So how could she know how to eat a bag? Number 4... Purses are for carrying things. If you don't know how a purse works I seriously doubt you have the skills to run a company properly. Women don't LOVE to carry a snack in their purse. They HAVE to carry a purse because pockets are not made appropriately in women's clothing to offer us the ability to walk around without being human targets. So while we have it, we throw snacks in it. We don't need special Pink Doritos to accomplish that.

Look, maybe i'm taking an aggressively extreme stance on this, but her points are extreme and they undermine equality among the sexes. I find it incredibly tactless that a FEMALE CEO would continue to perpetuate stereotypes about women in this manner.  Saying things like this, and attempting to sell products like this perpetuates an idea of what it is to be female that disparages feminine strength, feminine ingenuity, & sexual equality. But here is why that is really scary, because Mrs. Nooyi is head of GLOBAL strategy. I don't think she cares about independent, free thinking, loud, chip crunching American Women. I think that she means to market this in Countries that still draw deep lines between the equality of Men and Women. I think her goal is to market these in places that would see the oppression of Women remain ingrained in society. Why? Because that's where money is to be made. 'Women, you have to buy this bag for yourselves, and ANOTHER better bag for your husband and sons'... double the sales. Her comments are dangerous, I really believe that selling a watered down version of a product and saying it is for Women leads to Women being treated like watered down versions of people. Worse, saying a better version of food is only for men subconsciously tells women they are less than worthy of the same food, treatment, etc as men. That is an insane idea!

Doritos America had a great tweet that they posted that I want to share. "We already have Doritos for women — they’re called Doritos, and they’re loved by millions." I hope Mrs. Nooyi takes note, because it's true. Food is not just for men, it's for all of us.

Lastly, I just like to mention, as a chip blog. That if Pepsi Co really want to break some ground, they can start giving Americans better tasting chips. It's pretty simple. Source better quality ingredients, make your chips taste better! Expand the Simple and Simple Organic line. Show that quality has value. American society is moving away from plastic tasting junk foods, and since we are ALL HUMANS we want to eat things that taste good. Quality has been shown time and time again to produce better tasting food. Instead of thinking of some way to bamboozle people into buying Lady Doritos, or only focusing on emerging markets to keep selling your old products to; focus on innovation and upgrading the quality of what you're making. Expand the Doritos flavor range. We've all been eating the same 2 flavors for forever! (Actually at this point, it might be genius for Doritos to make fun of this and launch a heavy metal themed, extra crunchy bag of Doritos and call it Lady Doritos) But focus on the actual FOOD!

Years ago, Coca Cola admitted that they had not paid attention to changing desires from consumers until it was too late, by then Coca Cola was blamed for the obesity crisis and had to buy up expensive competitors like Vitamin Water to make its move towards the healthier choices consumers preferred. Does Pepsi want to look back in a few years and realize they were on the wrong side of history, remaining not only a beacon of crappy snacks, but as a brand that is synonymous with inequality?

Those are my thoughts, I know you don't come here for my political posts, it's supposed to be a stupid fun thing about chips... but Thank You for taking the time to read it and I owe you some new posts about what you're really here for soon.