Chicken magnate Frank Perdue has gone to that great concentrated feedlot operation in the sky. The first person to sell brand-name chicken, Frank was part of a strange phenomenon in American culture until his retirement in 1991: The old man as innocuous corporate mascot.
Right alongside the Brooke Shieldses and Cindy Crawfords and Fabios of yesteryear stood the geezer-barons of food commerce: Perdue, Orville Redenbacher, Dave Thomas of Wendy’s and the Bartyles and James wine cooler guys. Sure, they represented big, evil corporations that sold chemically-processed tripe we wouldn’t get near if we had any idea how it was made (except maybe for the popcorn) but they did it in such an amiable, doddering way that one had to fight off the urge to buy the product simply to humor them.
But alas, the food spokesmen of today are a different breed entirely: The Arby’s oven mitt and the annoying Quizno’s baby show a culture now obsessed with condescending to youth instead of condescending to the elderly. Where did we go astray?