August 22, 2025 • 6 mins
"Can a logo redesign really spark a political firestorm… or are we just addicted to outrage?"In this hilariously sharp and surprisingly deep episode of The Ben and Skin Show, hosts Ben Rogers, Jeff “Skin” Wade, Kevin “KT” Turner, and the ever-present spirit of Krystina Ray dive headfirst into the bizarre backlash surrounding Cracker Barrel’s recent rebrand. What starts as a simple logo update—removing the old white guy and his barrel—spirals into a full-blown culture war online. And the gang is here to unpack every ridiculous angle.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Track another edition of Things Track.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
All right, I don't know what y'all's morning routine is.
Mine is to I get up as early as I can,
I do my Japanese interval walking, and then I sit down,
I drink coffee, and I start scrolling the internet seeing
if there's any stories that grab my attention. And I
really hate what's happened to twitter X. It's tough. I mean,
(00:30):
it used to be my main source of like finding
things that I think are interesting to talk about, but
now it's also politically charged, even the support stuff.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
It's crazy.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
And so I'm looking and I'm reading a tweet that
I find humorous. I didn't even look at who the
guy was talking about it, but he's talking about Cracker
Barrel going woke, and he's like, come on, man, I
found Christ in a parking lot of a cracker barrel
I worked at. And I'm just seeing all these tracks.
I'm like, what is happening? He found it, like a
(01:01):
stain on a wall that looked like Jesus. No, no, no,
he accepted the Jesus Christ as his savior, comparently in
a parking lot at a cracker barrel. Okay, so the
Cracker barrel has very significant meaning to this guy. And
I've seen this politician before. He's a big guy in Florida,
Like he's pretty well known Desantus. No, it's not him,
he's a he's a congressman. And so anyways, I'm starting
(01:23):
I'm looking at all the chatter under this because I
was completely unaware. Maybe you guys were aware. Did you
know Cracker Barrel went through a rebrand?
Speaker 1 (01:31):
I did? I have seen all.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
This is one of my favorite things in the world,
when you know, looking at logos, considering logos, updating logos.
Speaker 1 (01:40):
I love all of it.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
Okay, did you have a strong thought on the Cracker
Barrel rebrand? I thought it was long overdue, And like
when you go into a Cracker Barrel, first of all,
you go through that gift shop.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
It's so weird. But just the logo itself is.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
An old, old white dude who's in a wooden chair
leaning against a barrel. And they basically just removed the
white dude and the barrel and just made it a
kind of a newer looking font. They did, and they
also changed the shape. But one of the things they
did with which I don't like, on the New Year's
ben joyceing this. You see, here's the old one, KT,
(02:18):
here's a new one. Is with the they put the
font in a barrel, all right, barrel shape makes sense,
but the font to me is like so small compared
to the rest of the barrel. The barrel overpowers the
font to me. So But anyways, it's not the sort
of thing that I would normally care about, and I
really don't care about, but I'm so interested in the reaction. Dude,
(02:39):
I love that stuff, and I love the new logo.
I think it's significantly better. And they also renovated the
inside of the restaurants and updated them a little bit
into one. I haven't been to a Cracker Barrel in
maybe a decade, but I saw the pictures of the
renovations and it looks much better. Okay, good, Yeah, it's
because I saw a modern farmhouse. So I'm thinking Chip
and Jojoe. I guess modern farmhouse one of the things.
(03:00):
So there's a Cracker Barrel near me, uh in Alan
right there off seventy five near McDermott somewhere pretty good. Well,
I want to go in it now and take a look,
because just walk around, you just walk around, I mean dude,
that's what happens. It's the whole there's a whole movie
about banks. He called Exit through the Gift Shop, and
it's about the commercialization of the world. And so when
(03:23):
you go to Cracker Barrel, you enter and you exit
through the gift shop and so and it's very much
like an old country store. And so the trick is,
all right, your kids are not going to make it
out of here without buying a piece of junk. One
of the problems with that, though, is you've created tons
of clutter, because that is the most cluttered place. Like
(03:45):
just like I walk in and get anxiety. I'm like, God,
is there Do they serve food here? And then you
sit down and the pancakes are badass. Food's really good.
The pancakes are badass. But I'm like, so discourse, because
this is all of our discourse now is about Okay,
(04:05):
Cracker Barrel's gone woke and I'm like, I'm looking at
it and I'm going, how well, how's that?
Speaker 1 (04:13):
That's what you deuce out of this.
Speaker 2 (04:15):
They changed a logo, They didn't add like a wrapper
on it. It's they just simplified the logo. As every
chain restaurant in the world.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
They're not allowed to do that. I still want to
white down it. You know what, the old logo didn't
ad a con veteran flag. I pissed.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
I mean, it's like, there's nothing about this and says
anything about DEI or wokeness. They just decluttered their logo
just as they're trying to declutter their restaurants. And all
you have to do is look at any story about
any business in the hospitality world right now, and they're
all trying to It's like the Jack in the box
(04:55):
story we had and the chili story we had in
the app. I mean, there's an their story about this
every single week.
Speaker 1 (05:03):
Why does this have to be a political touchstone?
Speaker 2 (05:06):
The stock has plunged of it, by the way, they've
lost as much as ninety four million dollars in market value.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
It took off on social media too, and that's a
big part of the reason. Like this happened to Wingstop recently,
Wingstop changed their fries okay, and their stock has gone
way down after being up in twenty twenty four, way
down because people on tiktokrack I went to wings stuff
and they're just crapping on the restaurant because they changed their.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
Fries, they made them Republican fries. No, I blame both parties,
and I hate both parties. I hate all of it.
I hate it, hate it, hate it so much. It's exhausting.
It's exhausting. I don't again, I'm not following the cracker
barrel lineage. I don't understand. Like even the stuff I
went and read and saw was like, I don't understand
how any of this is political, Like, so.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
What story though? You know?
Speaker 3 (05:54):
I mean, the news outlets are partially to blame for
a lot of this stuff we see.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
I think what it is is that oppertu social media
politicize it for their own gain, and then people react
to it. It also could be AI, Yeah, sure, like
here yake search for something that can be divisive and
political and put out a billion tweets about.
Speaker 1 (06:14):
It, right, No, I think you're right. Anyways, that's crazy.
Speaker 3 (06:18):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (06:19):
I guess e't a pancake. I don't know. Good luck, everybody,
Good luck?
Speaker 3 (06:22):
All right?
Speaker 2 (06:22):
Coming up next, we crank up the Wayback Machine, the
very first ever mosquito in the Wholt Prank.
Speaker 1 (06:28):
That's right, you're gonna get to hear it next
Track another edition of Things Track.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
All right, I don't know what y'all's morning routine is.
Mine is to I get up as early as I can,
I do my Japanese interval walking, and then I sit down,
I drink coffee, and I start scrolling the internet seeing
if there's any stories that grab my attention. And I
really hate what's happened to twitter X. It's tough. I mean,
(00:30):
it used to be my main source of like finding
things that I think are interesting to talk about, but
now it's also politically charged, even the support stuff.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
It's crazy.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
And so I'm looking and I'm reading a tweet that
I find humorous. I didn't even look at who the
guy was talking about it, but he's talking about Cracker
Barrel going woke, and he's like, come on, man, I
found Christ in a parking lot of a cracker barrel
I worked at. And I'm just seeing all these tracks.
I'm like, what is happening? He found it, like a
(01:01):
stain on a wall that looked like Jesus. No, no, no,
he accepted the Jesus Christ as his savior, comparently in
a parking lot at a cracker barrel. Okay, so the
Cracker barrel has very significant meaning to this guy. And
I've seen this politician before. He's a big guy in Florida,
Like he's pretty well known Desantus. No, it's not him,
he's a he's a congressman. And so anyways, I'm starting
(01:23):
I'm looking at all the chatter under this because I
was completely unaware. Maybe you guys were aware. Did you
know Cracker Barrel went through a rebrand?
Speaker 1 (01:31):
I did? I have seen all.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
This is one of my favorite things in the world,
when you know, looking at logos, considering logos, updating logos.
Speaker 1 (01:40):
I love all of it.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
Okay, did you have a strong thought on the Cracker
Barrel rebrand? I thought it was long overdue, And like
when you go into a Cracker Barrel, first of all,
you go through that gift shop.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
It's so weird. But just the logo itself is.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
An old, old white dude who's in a wooden chair
leaning against a barrel. And they basically just removed the
white dude and the barrel and just made it a
kind of a newer looking font. They did, and they
also changed the shape. But one of the things they
did with which I don't like, on the New Year's
ben joyceing this. You see, here's the old one, KT,
(02:18):
here's a new one. Is with the they put the
font in a barrel, all right, barrel shape makes sense,
but the font to me is like so small compared
to the rest of the barrel. The barrel overpowers the
font to me. So But anyways, it's not the sort
of thing that I would normally care about, and I
really don't care about, but I'm so interested in the reaction. Dude,
(02:39):
I love that stuff, and I love the new logo.
I think it's significantly better. And they also renovated the
inside of the restaurants and updated them a little bit
into one. I haven't been to a Cracker Barrel in
maybe a decade, but I saw the pictures of the
renovations and it looks much better. Okay, good, Yeah, it's
because I saw a modern farmhouse. So I'm thinking Chip
and Jojoe. I guess modern farmhouse one of the things.
(03:00):
So there's a Cracker Barrel near me, uh in Alan
right there off seventy five near McDermott somewhere pretty good. Well,
I want to go in it now and take a look,
because just walk around, you just walk around, I mean dude,
that's what happens. It's the whole there's a whole movie
about banks. He called Exit through the Gift Shop, and
it's about the commercialization of the world. And so when
(03:23):
you go to Cracker Barrel, you enter and you exit
through the gift shop and so and it's very much
like an old country store. And so the trick is,
all right, your kids are not going to make it
out of here without buying a piece of junk. One
of the problems with that, though, is you've created tons
of clutter, because that is the most cluttered place. Like
(03:45):
just like I walk in and get anxiety. I'm like, God,
is there Do they serve food here? And then you
sit down and the pancakes are badass. Food's really good.
The pancakes are badass. But I'm like, so discourse, because
this is all of our discourse now is about Okay,
(04:05):
Cracker Barrel's gone woke and I'm like, I'm looking at
it and I'm going, how well, how's that?
Speaker 1 (04:13):
That's what you deuce out of this.
Speaker 2 (04:15):
They changed a logo, They didn't add like a wrapper
on it. It's they just simplified the logo. As every
chain restaurant in the world.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
They're not allowed to do that. I still want to
white down it. You know what, the old logo didn't
ad a con veteran flag. I pissed.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
I mean, it's like, there's nothing about this and says
anything about DEI or wokeness. They just decluttered their logo
just as they're trying to declutter their restaurants. And all
you have to do is look at any story about
any business in the hospitality world right now, and they're
all trying to It's like the Jack in the box
(04:55):
story we had and the chili story we had in
the app. I mean, there's an their story about this
every single week.
Speaker 1 (05:03):
Why does this have to be a political touchstone?
Speaker 2 (05:06):
The stock has plunged of it, by the way, they've
lost as much as ninety four million dollars in market value.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
It took off on social media too, and that's a
big part of the reason. Like this happened to Wingstop recently,
Wingstop changed their fries okay, and their stock has gone
way down after being up in twenty twenty four, way
down because people on tiktokrack I went to wings stuff
and they're just crapping on the restaurant because they changed their.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
Fries, they made them Republican fries. No, I blame both parties,
and I hate both parties. I hate all of it.
I hate it, hate it, hate it so much. It's exhausting.
It's exhausting. I don't again, I'm not following the cracker
barrel lineage. I don't understand. Like even the stuff I
went and read and saw was like, I don't understand
how any of this is political, Like, so.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
What story though? You know?
Speaker 3 (05:54):
I mean, the news outlets are partially to blame for
a lot of this stuff we see.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
I think what it is is that oppertu social media
politicize it for their own gain, and then people react
to it. It also could be AI, Yeah, sure, like
here yake search for something that can be divisive and
political and put out a billion tweets about.
Speaker 1 (06:14):
It, right, No, I think you're right. Anyways, that's crazy.
Speaker 3 (06:18):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (06:19):
I guess e't a pancake. I don't know. Good luck, everybody,
Good luck?
Speaker 3 (06:22):
All right?
Speaker 2 (06:22):
Coming up next, we crank up the Wayback Machine, the
very first ever mosquito in the Wholt Prank.
Speaker 1 (06:28):
That's right, you're gonna get to hear it next
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark
My Favorite Murder is a true crime comedy podcast hosted by Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark. Each week, Karen and Georgia share compelling true crimes and hometown stories from friends and listeners. Since MFM launched in January of 2016, Karen and Georgia have shared their lifelong interest in true crime and have covered stories of infamous serial killers like the Night Stalker, mysterious cold cases, captivating cults, incredible survivor stories and important events from history like the Tulsa race massacre of 1921. My Favorite Murder is part of the Exactly Right podcast network that provides a platform for bold, creative voices to bring to life provocative, entertaining and relatable stories for audiences everywhere. The Exactly Right roster of podcasts covers a variety of topics including historic true crime, comedic interviews and news, science, pop culture and more. Podcasts on the network include Buried Bones with Kate Winkler Dawson and Paul Holes, That's Messed Up: An SVU Podcast, This Podcast Will Kill You, Bananas and more.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.