So, can someone explain this to non USAians?
Cracker Barrel, a kinda-sorta popular “Old Country Store” that prided itself on staying the same over the years…has undergone massive, sweeping changes in aesthetics. The man & barrel are from the sign, now gone. The dark wood walls covered in Americana are going away. I hear some of the food is going to change as well.
It’s weird because I’m seeing everybody slamming Cracker Barrel’s food, and I have never had a bad meal at Cracker Barrel. I’m not going out of my way to eat it, but every time I’ve gone it’s been nice.
I have enjoyed Cracker Barrel in the past, but I’m far from a frequent customer. However: anyone with half a brain can tell you the very last thing Cracker Barrel regulars want is change. Unless this change is accompanied by providing…something…with value equal or greater than what they’re taking away, we are witnessing intentional brand destruction and/or brand suicide.
You’re missing context.
Look at the dead logos.
Now look up how Cracker Barrel had to be sued in 2004 to stop segregating their dinning room.
That is pretty fucked up, never heard about it. It’s the usual suspects, “Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia”. Probably not an unspoken nationwide Cracker Barrel policy, more of a Southern thing, but it’s likely corporate knew it was going on & tolerated it.
The dead logos & old Southern country styling…WAS…their thing. It was their whole thing, now it’s gone, and they have nothing. Idk personally I don’t see it going well for them. Time will tell.
Right, but the point still stands. The type of person to frequent cracker barrel probably is an ancient racist. The rebrand will end them.
Not everybody, though. I’m with CoffeeJunkie; I go to Cracker Barrel because I like the food (and because they sell Hydrox cookies in the general store). I had no idea that it’s apparently a hang out for racists. If they’re around then they’re well hidden at my local Cracker Barrel locations.
I don’t think it’s like a nazi bar, I just know that the demographic is old white people and I just kinda assume. I haven’t been in ages but their biscuits are FANTASTIC.
Both them and Bob Evans offer “take home meals” that we’ve started ordering for the major holidays since my mother, aunt, and grandmother have passed. It is nice to be able to have a “big holiday meal” without all the prep/cleanup. Not exactly “cheap”, but considering the amount of time you save and stuff you’d have to buy, not much of a “splurge” either if you want a nice family meal like that for the holidays.
Good
Thanks! What is an Old Country Store?
So you approach the Cracker Barrel, and it’s got a bunch of rocking chairs out front you can rock on. You go inside, and immediately it’s like a ye olde General Store type vibe. An assortment of various goods, enough of them have an old-timey Americana feel. Postcards, candies, snacks, sodas, clothing, toys, kitchen/household items. You’d check in with the hostess & browse the goods as you wait to be seated.
From their site: https://guestrelations.crackerbarrel.com/s/article/About-Us#WheredidCrackerBarrelgetitsname
When our founder, Dan Evins, opened the first Cracker Barrel, he was passionate about recreating old country stores from his childhood along interstates and highways so that travelers would always have a place to stop, relax, get a good country meal and feel at home. Crackers used to be delivered to those old country stores in barrels, and people would congregate around them to discuss the news of the day – they were the original water coolers! Since the restaurant was meant to help people reconnect with friends and family over a good meal, it was a fitting name.
When you first walk into a cracker barrel, there is a small store that sells everything from knick knacks, clothing, jewelry, home decorations (candles, pictures), toys, stuffed animals, candy, bottle sodas, etc. It is basically a bit like a “tourist trap” style place, but not as tacky and more focused in what they sell. It does have a bit of a “down home” vibe to what they carry, but I’ve had a time or two where I’ve seen stuff there that wouldn’t be found in other stores in the area. An example would be soda/candy - they carry some classic stuff, but also carry stuff that would normally just be a regional thing.
Almost all of them are laid out the same way - you enter through a set of two double doors (helps with heating/cooling) and enter the store. The “store” portion itself is usually just a big rectangle with the hostess for the restaurant portion in the back corner. Along the side wall of that same corner, where you can pick up some candy/treats, as well as pay for anything from the store and/or for your meal in the restaurant.
You enter and exit through the store. It isn’t as common anymore, but “back in the day” places were a mix of places to buy stuff, but also get some food. They are set up in a similar fashion - you can go there just to eat, but they have odds/ends for you to check out as well.
Not sure if they still do it, but one of the more interesting thing they used to do was offer “books on tape” or “books on CD”. You could check them out from one store then return them to any other store. I had an aunt that would grab that when she was going to be on the road for a few days, as they usually had stuff that was newer than the local library, etc.
Amazing, thanks for the thorough description!
They got rid of the barrel and the cracker!
cracker barrel had a logo with racist undertones, like the other logos above it. it has recently been retired, much to the outrage of conservatives.
It’s a guy leaning against a barrel, what racial undertones are there?
idk, ask the nazis that are mad it got switched out.
The Nazis are always mad at any change. Just because they’re angry, doesn’t mean the change is good. Unfortunately, now what should be a discussion about the sterilization of all branding now got wrapped up in the culture wars. If McDonald’s had waited until now to disappear the Ronald McDonald mascot, the Nazis would be complaining about that too.
Okay just because a racist is mad doesn’t mean that what they’re mad about is necessarily racist.
Yeah close look, it doesn’t look like a typical black caricature, like Uncle Ben, and Aunt Jemima. It just looks like a older guy, sitting in a chair, with a barrel being used like a table. This would have described half my, white, family. Racists just think anything “old timey” changing is woke, because woke is what they don’t like. However, the company has a historical problem with overt racism, and most of their customer base has a lot of racists in it’s composition. So fuck them, they deserve to go under.
Ultimately this is just rage bait profiteering, and a distraction from the real hell going on.
Would everybody feel better if we just said that AI redesigned the logo?
/s
Old and new logo for those interested
They removed the Cracker and the Barrel from Cracker Barrel!😱
I’ve noticed no one seems to see that the new background is in the shape of a barrel
It just looks like a generic logo shape to me. It’s vaguely in the ahape of a barrel i suppose, but not really
It’s very clearly a barrel on its side imo
It’s still cracker erasure!
New logo sucks. Racists and wokists should be able to agree on this.
I was expecting more. Outlines, geometry, something…
However, looking at the old one, what are the words printed on? Is that a kidney?
I’ve honestly never noticed, but a little googling confirms that yes, it’s a pinto bean.
https://web.archive.org/web/20250317110059/https://www.crackerbarrel.com/newsroom/get-to-know-us
Haa, thanks for that!
Good thing that never got out, that’s too close to Mexican for the south :) /s
You’d be surprised how much people in the south love Mexican food. Anytime we would eat out with family in the south, it was always Mexican.
The newer logo makes them look like a fucking bank
Every food place wants to look generic and sterile now. And their logos reflect that
This is 100% a New Coke move. They will change it back and pretend like they “listened to their loyal customers.”
The new logo is too awful. It’s meant to provoke outrage. And I say this as someone who doesn’t like Cracker Barrel.
“We can’t afford to keep making elaborate signs”
It went from being a terrible logo, to only mediocre.
the West has fallen 😞
When your whole schtick is nostalgia, but all the folks who remember the things you reference are now dead or otherwise unable to come to your restaurants, you either need to change your schtick, or you need to tap into the nostalgia of a younger generation. There aren’t as many Amos & Andy and Howdy Doody fans on the highways these days.
I would totally make it a point to frequent a steampunk themed Cracker Barrel.
Or just be happy with the niche. Not everything needs to be global.
But its niche is disappearing, so it either finds a new niche, or it goes out of business. Its niche was always “middle-aged people’s childhood memories,” but how many of today’s middle-aged people grew up listening to radio shows and watching old men sitting around cracker barrels?
Hell, I AM middle-aged, and one of my grandfathers was a sharecropper who eventually started his own corner store, so I SHOULD be exactly their demographic… but my childhood memories are of Charlie’s Angels, Radio Shack computers and Run DMC. Their niche is almost nonexistent now.
That’s a weird way of saying your grandpa never took you to Cracker Barrel.
but how many of today’s middle-aged people grew up listening to radio shows
THE Shadow knows! MUAHAHAHAHA!
Am middle aged too, grew up on nerdy old shit. Don’t forget to stock up on Blue Anthracite coal and Chesterfields!
Radium water or nothing! They’ll take it away over my dead body!!
Cracker Barrel was never global. It has always been a strictly US phenomenon.
There aren’t as many Amos & Andy and Howdy Doody fans on the highways these days.
If there are, they’re probably driving the wrong way on the highway.
There goes the neighborhood.
Uncle Ben is absolutely iconic to me, even though I agree with their reasons for the rebrand.
I love that this is the faux news rage o’ the day. They literally can’t come up with anything else because they’re basking in all of their goals being satisfied.
Who cares. I got food poisoning from them twice, separate locations and years. The second bout of food poisoning sent me to the hospital, but also indirectly lead me to coming out as transgender. So thanks but no thanks, your food is disgusting.
Ah yes. This is the future libs wants.
The Cracker Barrel to Transgender pipeline.
thats a story id love to hear
Wait. Is it called Cracker Barrel cuz the logo is a cracker leaning on a barrel? Never put that together.
No its a barrel of hard tack (aka crackers). Supposed to be old timely grocery store version of a water cooler.
I love this running gag.
Hard tack is absolutely not crackers, lol. You will chip a tooth trying to bite into it. Best to soak in your coffee first to soften up.
Modern crackers are the end product of what started as a convenience food for soldiers and sailors, recorded as far back as 1190. Known as hard tack or ship’s biscuit, they were made out of a mixture of grain and/or legume flour and water, shaped into tablets, then baked until brick hard.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cracker_(food)
Hardtack (or hard tack) is a type of dense cracker made from flour, water, and sometimes salt. Hardtack is very inexpensive and long-lasting, allowing it to be used for sustenance in the absence of perish.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HardtackOk, you got me there.
oh, the only reason I knew that was thanks to the Townsends YouTube channel. absolutely a fascinating historical channel, if you have any interest in that sort of thing. they focus primarily on 18th century living, and also some 17th century as well.
Best improvised weapon available. Nobody expects a hard tack to the head
They really are like bricks.
Crackers used to be shipped in barrels.
Naturally they got really nasty really fast. It wasn’t until they invented sealed packaging we more or less have now that they became tolerable. It was kinda a bad thing to name a restaurant after.
Cracker barrel went out the window with the Mail Pouch cut plug chawin’ by the stove.
Changed the approach of the traveling’ salesman. Made it pretty hard…
But you’ve got to know the territory
I assume it’s a Barrelof Crackers, but I dunno.
Ootl, what happened?
Cracker barrel changed their logo to some generic corporate thing and Republicans are mad about it for the wrong reasons
They think it’s a woke issues for some reason, when really it’s just corporate slop
I’m mad about it because of the “modern” low-detail logo art style that feels like an art downgrade whenever corpos adopt it. Not a Republican. Is that a good reason?
As long as you aren’t mad about it because you think it’s some anti-white or anti-southern culture thing, think whatever you want about it. Nobody was offended anyone called the art ugly. Shit, the people paid to design it probably think it’s ugly.
Yeah it’s funny the amount of people I saw blaming the “DEI designers” and “Gen Z” instead of the CEO/Board of directors and the largest shareholders, which unsurprisingly are Vanguard and Blackrock. Boomers mad that the companies funding their retirement accounts are being capitalist and focusing on quarterly hyper growth but then defending capitalism as the last bastion of freedom
They’re mad at the wrong people.
Nope, I just think it’s ugly. Oversimplified design is lame. I want it to actually look like a work of art to the maximum extent possible rather than a generic logo that AI could’ve made.
Why is race being pulled into this? Honestly I’m so confused why you Americans love to hate eachother so much than you turn everything into a fight
My guess is republicans think the logo was changed to remove the “white” guy from the logo. Like, Cracker Barrel went “woke” and needed to be inclusive of all of races. Thus, removed the white guy.
In reality, this logo just looks like a corporate shlop. Modern simple design like every other corporate logo on earth.
Because conservatives never coped with losing the civil war, and as a result they never stopped seeing slave rebellions and race wars around every corner, even if they have to manufacture them themselves. They literally can’t stop talking about this stupid shit, like it was a conspiracy to remove an old white dude from the logo for “woke” reasons and not because making a new bland logo is the corporate version of doing a barrel roll because it’s a neat trick.
If you haven’t seen that dumbass take I’m happy for you, but don’t shoot the messenger. I’m not the one that came up with it.
Sorry, but you’re officially Republican now.
That’s why I’m mad about it, too
Does anyone remember the last meltdown republicans had about Cracker Barrel? They added vegetarian sausage to the menu, and I think it made Tucker Carlson?
So if they remove it can we finally be free of him?
(I know what you meant but the opportunity for the phrasing as-written was too funny to pass up. X3)
I’m addition to removing the cartoon old man and barrel iconography, Cracker Barrel is reducing the amount of random junk on the walls, and painting the bare wooden walls white. (Select stores only, not everything gets remodeled all at once). Probably they’re trying to appeal more to a younger generation or something.
Ewww… I’m so fucking tired of everything being a boring white
Any word yet if this is private equity stripping the copper or are they just morons?
Two things can be true at once. Who knows?
IIRC BlackRock owns 16% shares of Cracker Barrel, and “stripping the copper” seems to be their go-to strategy. 😬
It’s a publicly traded company, so no, this isn’t private equity bleeding a corpse. They seem to be trying to modernize and broaden their appeal to get out of an extended post-covid slump. Per Wikipedia:
In May 2024, Cracker Barrel revealed that 16% of their customer base had not returned since 2020.
because a disproportionate amount of their clientele don’t believe in vaccines, and fought against wearing wasks… wonder where that percentage went?
I ate there once and the food was terrible. They should work on that.
Say what you will, but those 84 people stayed because there’s no better place for microwaved insults to Southern cuisine this side of the Walmart frozen dinners aisle.
Given it’s private equity, my guess would be both.
painting the bare wooden walls white
Welp, they just lost my business (not that I’d been there in years before this anyway…).
Painting real wood (other than maybe pine or poplar) is like painting brick: just don’t do it!
So to appeal to a younger generation they made a minimalist logo and are removing any trace of personality? I mean, their personality wasn’t my thing (haven’t been in many, many years) but I have no idea why they couldn’t try new personality instead of no personality.
Alternatively, have they tried making their food good? That might work.
Like if they did a Steampunk theme, that’d work
I don’t know if it would work, but I’d definitely show up for it.
I’m in favor of a good food theme.
“The terrible generic food is too expensive to make better. Change the sign and paint the walls.”
- The CEO, probably
My nostalgia for the brand is the nostalgia they showed when I was a kid; old tin ads on the wall for various sodas and candies and motor oil or whatnot. We used to stop there on road trips when I was a kid because the bathrooms would usually be pretty clean and wandering the store part would let us stretch our legs a bit. Sometimes we’d get some old-fashioned candy or gum or soda. Sometimes we’d actually eat at the restaurant side. Us kids would only ever get pancakes, no matter the time of day.
I can’t remember the last time I stopped at one now. Most of our road trips are heading north to see my wife’s parents in Canada. I’ve never noticed them existing north of southern Virginia and that comes up fairly early in our drive. My wife tried eating at one once before we got married but it sounds like what she got wasn’t good, especially the green beans. I’m not sure how much I’d trust the food that wasn’t on their all-day breakfast menu. It’s harder to mess up breakfast.
I’m not saying there’s not a potential market for a place that appeals to nostalgia of the ’70s–’90s, maybe the music, arcade games, pop culture references, Crystal Pepsi, but it would need to be a completely different brand even if it came from the same company.
Homie and his barrel got bounced from the logo.
Is that native American lady caricature holding a big stack of pancakes?
Land O Lakes butter.
Got rid of the native, but kept the land… They didn’t think that one through did they?
Par for the course…
Just the biggest stick of butter ever?
She’s holding the box of butter, which has her picture on it… Where she’s holding the same box for infinite recursion
Þat’s a normal sized Minnesotan single serving of butter.
I’m not a huge fan of either logo tbh, they could have kept a bit more texture on the barrel
Who checks notes cares?
I honestly thought they went out of business. The only one I might see on a regular basis closed and I didn’t see any on a recent short road trip. Whatever, their food was mediocre anyway.
There are everywhere in the southeast, like nearing howard-johnsons fame. There’s no wait to get in these days though. Honestly, it’s been a long time since I’ve waitied more than 10 minutes to get seated anywhere.
Wait, so Republicans are woke now?
