Wednesday, December 19, 2007

$11.50 for a Hamburger? Y'all must be crazy

I was going to touch on this subject myself, but Joe Posnanski did it already and it turns out that his sentiments are pretty much mine. So take it away Joe:

OK, have you seen these reality-based commercials that Burger King is doing where they take the Whopper out of their restaurants and film people’s stunned reactions? I’m not going to lie to you, these really bother me. I admit, this is at least in part because I consider Burger King a 20-miler — meaning I’d only go there if there isn’t another fast-food restaurant within 20 miles. But more, this bothers me as a TV commercial enthusiast because it’s so freaking pointless. Yeah, we get it. People who go into Burger King will probably expect to have the opportunity to buy Whoppers. This has nothing to do with quality. Whoppers may be (and are) horrendous — but they’re ALL YOU’VE GOT.

I once went into a breakfast place in Jacksonville, and I ordered eggs and orange juice and the waitress said, “Oh, sorry, we’re out of orange juice.” Yeah. Out of orange juice. I want you to think about this for a moment.

1. This was a BREAKFAST PLACE — one of those places that closes down at 11:30. It only served breakfast.

2. This breakfast place was in Florida. You know. FLORIDA? Sunshine State?

3. They were out of orange juice.

Was I upset? Sure. They could have filmed me saying to the waitress, “You’re joking, right? You’re at a breakfast place in Florida — I was expecting to have Anita Bryant herself come out here to personally serve me orange juice and lecture me about whatever whacked out thing she’s into now, evils of homosexuality, saving children, whatever. No orange juice? This is a gag, right?”

Of course, I didn’t say any of that or anything else. I never do. I just THOUGHT that. But had I said that, I don’t see how that would have been an endorsement for their orange juice. I think Pizza Hut pizza is ghastly bad. But if I was in the emergency situation of having to order something from Pizza Hut, and I stopped in, and they said, “no, we don’t have pizza today,” well, yeah, I would be mad too. Doesn’t make the pizza or the Whopper any less crappy.

Well said Joe.

And since I have nothing else to add on the subject, can somebody please tell me if I'm living the high life? I went into this bar the other day and.......

Okay never mind.

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