If you haven’t heard the brouhaha over Lady Doritos yet, I’d be surprised. It all started last week when the CEO of PepsiCo, Indra Nooyi, was being interviewed for Freakonomics Radio. In that interview, she discussed the difference between how men and women eat chips. For the record, here’s what she said:
“What a lot of the young guys (do when they) eat their chips, they love their Doritos and they lick their fingers with great glee. And when they reach the bottom of the bag, they pour the little broken pieces into their mouth because they don’t want to lose that taste of the flavor and the broken chips in the bottom. Women I think would love to do the same but they don’t, they don’t like to crunch too loudly in public, and you know they don’t lick their fingers generously and they don’t like to pour the little broken pieces and the flavor into their mouth.”
Basically, she’s saying that young men are barbaric in their eating habits while we delicate women prefer to keep our pinkies up while we sip tea. Since we’re on the record, let me say that I am not one of those ladies.
In fact, I don’t think many women who eat Doritos or any other kind of chip are, either. When I eat chips, those babies are everywhere. There’s a reason why there is a thing called “boob chips”. I’m sucking that dusty, cheesy, chemical crap off my fingers like I’m at 10 cent wing night and haven’t eaten in a week. And you can bet I’m tipping that bag up to get every last crumb.
To her credit, Nooyi didn’t specifically say that there would be “Lady Doritos”. What she did say, when asked to clarify if there would be male and female specific product lines, she replied that
“It’s not a male and female as much as (asking) are there snacks for women that can be designed and packaged differently and yes, we are looking at it and we are getting ready to launch a bunch of them soon. For women, you know, low crunch, the full taste profile, not have so much of the flavor stick on the fingers, and how can you put it in your purse, because women love to carry a snack in their purse.”
So, yeah, someone else came up with the Lady Doritos moniker but, honestly, she did indicate that what they’re working on are “snacks for women”. I can’t even.
And, of course, PepsiCo responded to the online meltdown. A spokeswoman (shouldn’t the CEO be considered a spokeswoman, too?) said that “the reporting on a specific Doritos product for female consumers is inaccurate.” She went on to say that
“We already have Doritos for women – they’re called Doritos, and they’re enjoyed by millions of people every day. At the same time, we know needs and preferences continue to evolve and we’re always looking for new ways to engage and delight our consumers.”
Doesn’t that sound like a politically correct way to say, “Yup, we’re making Lady Doritos but we’re not calling them that now”?
And here’s my favorite part. When asked what Ms. Nooyi meant by “snacks for women that can be designed and packaged differently,” the spokeswoman declined to elaborate but did say, “I can’t yet give any more details beyond what Indra relayed in the podcast. “However, I will be able to in a few months.”
What the what? “I will be able to in a few months”???
Once again, sounds like code for “Lady Doritos will be available in a few months but, obviously, with a different name now that we think about it.”
“Snacks for women”. Reminds me of the SNL commercial from 1997 for Chess for Girls (click on the image to watch the commercial). Mark my words, Lady Doritos are coming (“in a few months”) to a store near you cleverly disguised as “Less messy with the same full flavor you love. Now in a new travel pak size that reduces breakage!”
~ Karen