Cracker Barrel Conundrum

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Boston's Bulldozer Never sleeps. The Kooner Report weekend edition on
the Voice of Boston.

Speaker 2 (00:06):
W RKO six one seven two six six sixties eight
sixty eight is the number here. Six one seven two
sixty six sixty eight sixty eight. This is the Kooner Report.
I'm Sandy Shack filling in for Jeff Cooner, and as
we end the show and the week, I want to
give you hope in the war against dei wokeness intolerance.

(00:27):
You know, before, before the break, we were talking about
examples from the of wokeness being destroyed by the marketplace
of bud Light in twenty twenty three. But you know,
we just got an example of this last week. In
the past couple of weeks. If you've seen the the

(00:48):
the trials and tribulations of Cracker Barrel, I don't know
if you've seen it, if you paid attention to it,
it it it certainly interested me. Cracker Barrel has has
long been known for you know, it's a combination of
rustic charm and country dishes like you know, biscuits and gravy.
And I go to Cracker Barrel. There's a cracker Barrel

(01:09):
at the excuse me at the outlet mall here in
Massachusetts that has a that's right there that we kind
of it's like destination shopping. We do shopping and then
we go get comfort food at the cracker Barrel. But
it's new. CEO decided that the old approach wasn't working
anymore and she planned some major changes. She said that

(01:30):
we're just not as relevant as we once were. And
this is at a conference call on her you know,
with all the affiliates, the the the people on her
board and so forth, and she wanted to make some changes.
I mean, have you heard this before.

Speaker 1 (01:47):
Hmmm.

Speaker 2 (01:48):
Apparently she was not familiar with the bud Lights saga,
and you know, she wanted to to wake things up
a little bit, all right. They wanted to some of
the chaines were, you know, putting certain new things on
the menu like chili corn bread or halopenya corn bread
and okay, and some new menu items. So far, I

(02:09):
don't have a problem with with any of that, do you.
But then she made a decision to do something that
sparked a firestorm, a social media firestorm, and that was
they wanted to change the logo, redesign the logo. It's
the first redesign in forty eight years and it removed

(02:31):
the iconic old man leading on a barrel, as well
as the pinto bean shape behind the name, which was
a nod to one of the original side dishes offered
when Cracker Barrel opened back in nineteen sixty nine. And
you know, the chain's name itself comes from the barrels
that they used to deliver used to deliver the crackers

(02:53):
to the country stores, and then they would double as
makeshift tables for community gatherings, and you know, people found
it iconic and comforting, and the rebrand basically wiped that out.
It said nothing about history or tradition, and it was
it kind of looked like it was, how do we

(03:14):
make this as generic as possible and not offend anybody,
which is a very woke approach to business. And I
would think that people would have learned not to do that.
And almost immediately, Cracker Barrel lost one hundred million dollars
in market value. Shares fell from fell seven point two

(03:36):
percent almost immediately, and it was just like wow, I mean,
the market just had a vicious, vicious response to this,
and you know, I would have thought that they would
have figured out that wokeness is an investment factor that
you have to they have to, you know, put into

(03:58):
the mix. You have to kind of figure out, especially
since you know, if you're a publicly held company, you
have a responsibility to your shareholders. You can't use this
company just to promote your own political agenda. And that's
what wokeness does. It's generally defined as subjecting the culture
and business to left wing dogma involving race, sex, and

(04:20):
viewing things that are Americana as bad. And when your
brand is tied up with Americana, as Cracker Barrels is,
you're slitting your own throat. And that's what they discovered,
is that that's what was going to happen. They were
slitting their own throat. So what happened.

Speaker 1 (04:39):
Well?

Speaker 2 (04:40):
President Trump weighed in on the whole Cracker Barrel thing,
which I thought was good. I thought that was a
very good thing. He posted on his social media account,
Cracker Barrel should go back to the old logo, admit
a mistake based on customer response the poll, and managed

(05:01):
the company better than ever before. They got a billion
dollars with the free publicity if they play their cards right.
Very tricky to do but a great opportunity have a
major news conference today, make Cracker Barrel a winner again. Remember,
in just a short period of time, I made the
United States of America the hottest country anywhere in the world.
One year ago it was dead. So he's giving the

(05:26):
management of Cracker Barrel a roadmap back out of the
woke well that they found themselves in when they tried
to screw around with their with their background of being
American kitch basically. And so what did Cracker Barrel do?
I think, you know, given the fact that President Trump

(05:47):
just showed them the way, they caved to public pressure,
and they're going to switch the logo back from the
generic hexagon with the word Cracker Barrel in it to
the old timer again. And I think that that is appropriate,
and I think that it was about time. It's funny

(06:09):
because Cracker Barrel's founder, co founder, Tommy Low, who's ninety
three years old, was not happy with what was going
on and had a few words to say to everybody
about their attempt to rebrand Cut seven A please Mike

(06:32):
logo rolled out the other day.

Speaker 1 (06:34):
Oh that's crazy, that's nothing, that's to bland, nothing, It's pitiful.

Speaker 2 (06:43):
Do you think she knows the story of Cracker Barrel.

Speaker 1 (06:45):
I don't think so. La heard she was a Taco Bell,
but us Taco Bell know about Cracker Barrel and count
food and food is something that did need to work.
All the seven hundred million dollars to do that is
all just throwing money out the street.

Speaker 2 (07:06):
Yeah, they're just throwing good money after bad basically is
what he's saying. And that's the guy who founded the company,
made a successful nationwide chain and became part of the
you know, American zeitgeist, the American lexicon Cracker Barrel. And
then you have this this woke you know CEO coming

(07:27):
in going from Taco Bell apparently saying I can fix this,
I can make it even better. And m mmmm. We
learned a tough lesson, and that is the rules that
worked under the Biden administration, which was promoting intolerance and
which was promoting policy over merits and screw profits don't

(07:50):
work anymore. That's a hard lesson to learn.

Speaker 1 (07:53):
That Jeff doesn't get a day off. This request came
from his wife. The Kuna Report weekend edition on the
Voice of Boston w r KL