A camera panning over a lush, green California landscape paired with a saccharine female commercial voiceover: I was certain we were heading somewhere similar to Hidden Valley, the mythical birthplace of ranch dressing, when this ad started to play. About fifteen seconds in, I was horrified to find that the voice belonged to the Sun-Maid Raisins Girl — but not the radiant version I had grown up with. This woman was creepy and animatronic, seemingly dreamt up by a Pixar artist in the throes of an acid trip.
If anything, this was a lesson that nothing stays the same — least of all the ladies who grace food packaging.
Utz Girl
The original incarnation of the Utz girl, introduced in 1921, was far more human looking than the current version — mostly because she actually has a nose. According to an Utz company spokesperson (my secret dream job), she was drawn to resemble a flapper. After a streamlined redesign in 1968, the Utz Girl received a complete overhaul in 1987 and remains the same today. She is with the Natty Boh man and they consistently place on The New York Observer’s Snacking Power Couples list.
Morton Salt Girl
In the early 20th century, the Morton Salt Company launched a campaign to advertise their new, innovative product: free-flowing table salt that came in a container with a pouring spout. N.W. Ayer & Company provided Joy Morton and his son Sterling with fifteen potential ads, but it was one of a little girl spilling salt while clutching an umbrella on a rainy day that particularly stuck because, according to Sterling, it was “the whole story in a picture.” The Morton Salt Girl was redesigned more frequently than any other logo I came across, with new versions rolled out in 1921, 1933, 1941, 1956, and 1968. In the very first, she’s a bumbling toddler barely capable of holding on to the salt container and umbrella at the same time. Over the years, she gets a more graceful grip of her umbrella, slimmer legs, and a yellow babydoll dress. She also made her way onto that Jawbreaker t-shirt that pretty much every guy I had a crush on in high school owned.
Little Debbie
Little Debbie is based on a photo of Debbie McKee, the McKee Food owners’ granddaughter, that was taken in 1959. She was subtly redesigned in 1985 and then very recently in 2013. Honestly, she looks pretty much the same and I would friggin’ kill for a Zebra Cake right now.
Wendy
Dave Thomas may have had four children, but it was his youngest, Melinda Lou, or “Wendy,” who was chosen to be the name and the face of his fast food chain that would go on to become famous for serving up disconcertingly square-shaped hamburgers. From 1969-1976, she’s scrawled as a lo-fi illustration who’s sitting at a slight angle. In 1976, she was redesigned slightly — the color scheme remains the same but the hues are more saturated, the lines more smoothly drawn, and she’s viewed head-on. In February 2013, she received the first major makeover in decades — and, of course, Fox News was on it.
Sun-Maid Raisins Girl
The Sun-Maid Raisin Girl also has the distinction of being based on a real person: Lorraine Collett Petersen. Back in 1915, Lorraine was drying her hair in her parents’ backyard when she was discovered and asked to pose for a painting while holding a basket of grapes. (Totally fucking weird, but I digress.) A year later, her likeness was added to the product line. The current, non-animatronic version that appears on product packaging was finalized in 1970, with Lorraine being phased out in favor of a younger woman who worked for Sun-Maid’s packaging supplier named Delia von Meyer. The most recent version that appears in commercials was unveiled in 2009. When you Google Image Search the Sun-Maid Raisins girl, this quasi-erotic drawing is a result, proving that nothing is sacred.
Miss Chiquita
Miss Chiquita was originally drawn in 1944 as a sexy anthropomorphic banana. In 1987, the artist behind the Pink Panther, Oscar Grillo, turned her into a vivacious Latin American woman. The playful, effervescent nature of the Chiquita logo stands in stark contrast of the company’s reputation for giving money to violent Colombian paramilitary groups and committing human rights violations for several decades.
Aunt Jemima
The Aunt Jemima logo has perhaps the most contentious, uncomfortable past of all the female food packaging logos. Founder Chris Rutt was inspired to name his company Aunt Jemima after attending a blackface minstrel show and witnessing a performance of the vaudeville song “Old Aunt Jemima.” For many years, a mythology was carefully crafted around the Aunt Jemima brand; this fictional character was upheld as an example of the romanticized antebellum south, a “mammy” who happily took care of white folk. Former slave Nancy Green was even hired to play Aunt Jemima at the World’s Fair in 1893; she was tasked with cooking up pancakes and regaling visitors with stories of feeding Confederate soldiers during the Civil War. Alarmingly, it was not until 1989 when the logo was redesigned so that Aunt Jemima lost her headscarf and was transformed into the image we see on pancake mix and syrup today. It’s no wonder that Gladys Knight inspired such a backlash when she agreed to appear in commercials for the brand in 1994.
Land O’ Lakes Indian Maiden
The discourse surrounding whether or not Native American sports logos are offensive hasn’t quite hit the butter aisle yet. The Land O’ Lakes Indian Maiden logo was originally painted in 1928, then updated in the 1950s by Patrick DesJarlait, an Ojibwa artist. The logo’s garnered the most attention in recent years for a trick discovered in the mid-aughts, most likely by a stoned teenage boy. And, of course, who can forget the existential crisis she inspired in Sally Draper in Season 4 of Mad Men? “When I think about forever I get upset. Like the Land of Lakes butter has that Indian girl, sitting holding a box, and it has a picture of her on it, holding a box, with a picture of her on it, holding a box. Have you ever noticed that?”
***
I’ve watched that Sun-Maid Raisins commercial probably a dozen times while writing this piece, trying to place exactly what was so unnerving about the advertisement. If the animated Sun-Maid Raisins girl had just been introduced to me at that time, I think I would’ve found her less off-putting if I wasn’t so keenly aware of what she was replacing. The brands that use female mascots aren’t new or innovative by any means. They’re foods many Americans, myself included, grew up eating and subsequently associating with whatever girl or woman was plastered on the packaging. They may not be locally sourced, or organic, or calorically sensible — but taste is so often intertwined with loyalty and nostalgia.
Redesigning these women is a delicate process — they need to be updated while still retaining the familiarity that keeps the consumer coming back to the brand again and again. Sometimes, like with Aunt Jemima, it’s a necessary way to shed ugly associations with a difficult part of history. It may be long overdue but ignored, such as in the case of the Land O’Lakes Indian Maiden. If done extremely subtly, like Little Debbie’s makeover, the consumer will continue to hold onto the childhood pleasure of eating a Honey Bun or Swiss Roll — even when they know it’s not in vogue to eat something with an ingredient list that long and unpronounceable. Or, as with the poor Sun-Maid Raisins girl, they’re hurtled into the 21st century a little too quickly, losing that specific, recognizable charm.
Tags: advertising, business, foods, Gabriella Paiella, snacks
Related Posts
This is great! Little Debbie looks like the same face put through different Instagram filters over time (with minor changes of course). I’m also fascinated by food packaging and logos, especially the fact that fast food logos are almost entirely red- and yellow-based. Nothing about either of those colors screams hunger to me, but then again I haven’t spent hundreds of hours focus-grouping logo colors, so.
This is a lovely, fascinating, quirky article. I love the Morton Salt logo too much. And I kind of want to BE the Sun-Maid Raisin girl.
Love this. I have to dispute the mid-aughts designation through for the land o’lakes girl trick. I seem to recall reading about that same trick in a YA book I probably was reading in the mid to late 90s. Could be wrong though, and I don’t remember the name of the book! Anyone else?
I learned about the Land o’Lakes trick from The Simpsons. And then I looked up the episode and found out it aired in 2007 (“Little Big Girl”). How could I remain ignorant for so long?
My mom taught me the Land O’ Lakes trick when I was a teenager in the late 90s, and she knew about it from her childhood in the late 60s… so yeah, way before the mid-aughts!
Yup. My mom confirms knowing about it from growing up in the 60s as well.
It’s definitely old – my mother told me about it sometime in the 90s, and I believe she had heard it from somebody she worked with no later than the early 80s. She wasn’t sure how to do it, though, and we couldn’t figure it out because we were under the impression that you were supposed to fold the box, not cut it.
Sils and Berie do the trick in Lorrie Moore’s Who Will Run the Frog Hospital?, which came out in ’95 and takes place in the early 70s. Does that ring a bell?
San Joaquin Valley, more like UNCANNY Valley, amiright? Well, kudos to Sun-Maid for at least inspiring this article. I have never looked so closely at the Land O’ Lakes maiden.
As someone who thinks Mad Men spends too much time on personal drama and not enough on How Ads Get Made! I think this is fantastic!
Somehow I had never seen the Sun-Maid commercial. That shit is deeeeeeep in the uncanny valley.
I never thought about how many random food items have mascot-women. This was a cool read, thanks!
I’ve thought the same thing that Sally Draper thought about the Land O’ Lakes butter, except with barber shop mirrors.
I never understood why Natty Boh and the Utz girl got together. Long distance relationships are hard.
There’s a girl in my office that has a picture of the Natty Boh guy proposing to the Utz girl and it confused me for so long. I also am convinced that the Natty Boh guy is a cyclops.
plus it’s always weird when couples look alike.
Love triangle with the Pringles guy
History & snacks, together at last! <3 this.
I remember when I was little and they redesigned the Betty Crocker portrait.
In 1986, New York artist Harriet Perchik portrayed Betty Crocker as a professional woman, approachable, friendly, competent and as comfortable in the boardroom as she is in the dining room.
Oh, the eighties. So many boardrooms, so little time.
1986 Betty has a bitchin’ tie.
Honestly, seeing “quasi-erotic” linked to deviantart, I was expecting MUCH worse.
If there’s anything I can pun-intended gobble up, it’s the history and cultural study of 20th-century American food culture. Also, now I’m hankering for fries dipped in Frosty.
I saw the Land o’ Lakes trick back in ’91. Now I want to research the first known sighting…
As a brit, I have no real knowledge or attachment to any of these brands or logos. But I do remember getting distraught – and I mean distraught – when they changed the Birdseye man.
Thinking about it, I don’t think there are many brands that use a noticeable ‘person’ to sell the bran here? It’s something that seems a little old-fashioned here. It tends to be pcitures of the goods, or generic pictures of Middle-Class People Having Fun, or weird pictures of frogs and rotting lions.
Aw, but I have a crush on Bertie Bassett and his crown-cracking allsorts.
“weird pictures of frogs and rotting lions” Oh boy, please tell me this isn’t advertising the latest advancements in British Crisp Flavor Technology. (“Now with more rotten Lion!”)
I like that butter is considered a snack for this post.
Butter is the ultimate snack.
The butter package/boobs trick is also in “Chilly Scenes of Winter” the Ann Beattie book which Google tells me was published in 1976.
So it was…hmmmm.
Kinderschokolade changed their logo from this to this in 2006 and people were up in arms about it. There was a huge petition to change it back, with the war cry of ‘Kevin muss weg’, Kevin has to go. Kevin because the name was very popular at the time and it’s kind of a synonym for a spoiled brat no-one likes. Plus Kevinismus/Kevinism is the word for the trend to give children exotic names in a desperate attempt to be exceptional.
God I am going to buy so many zebra cakes tonight.
I have to say I have always loved the Morton salt girl. Much more than her scandalous sister the Coppertone beach baby.
… who was Jodie Foster. Didja know?
No way!
Oh I just dislike Coppertone gal so much! Here I was smiling over this cool article, and now I’m gnashing my teeth instead.
Ack oh no! I’m sorry!
…zebra cake?
Richard Peabody, I’m In Love With The Morton Salt Girl.
I had no idea my life was leading me to this. I am so happy.
Thank you.
You are very welcome. 🙂
Richard Peabody, I'm In Love With The Morton Salt Girl.
Wendy’s had an ad recently with the real Wendy in it, and honestly it was a little off putting to see Grown-Up Wendy
I have to admit, I don’t understand at all why the Chiquita lady is not racist but the Land o’ Lakes Indian Maiden is. They look equally racist/non-racist to me. Especially after the Ojibwa redesign. No?
I have to admit, I don't understand at all why the Chiquita lady is not racist but the Land o' Lakes Indian Maiden is. They look equally racist/non-racist to me. Especially after the Ojibwa redesign. No?
The Sun Maid girl will always be Sun Mad to me: http://americanart.si.edu/education/corazon/galer…
Land of Lake trick in the mid – aughts? You are too funny — kids have been doing that forever – 1960 was my first viewing of the “trick” and no claimed to have invented – it was simply part of “kid culture” back then. Not born yesterday.
You are very welcome. 🙂
The 1968 version of the Morton Salt logo was the day job of excellent artist Bailey Doogan:
http://www.baileydoogan.com/