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The Devil's Takin' Names


From my (limited) research the origin of this rant dates back to the spring/summer of 2009.

I was at 7-Eleven, a couple blocks from where I was living at the time, strolling through the chip section looking for something to snack on. All of a sudden something caught my eye. There was a new flavour of Doritos! This bag was white with a question mark in the centre of the bag and no name describing what taste would be found within. I was stoked! Doritos rarely has a dud flavour. I snatched up a full size bag, paid the lady and sprinted home. I don't remember the exact series of events that unfolded when I got to my apartment so I will describe what is the most likely scenario.

I opened the door to the apartment, "New Doritos flavour!" I most likely exclaimed to my roommates Mike and/or Adam as I opened the bag with the excitement of a 6 year old on Christmas morning. I darted my hand into the bag and pulled a couple Doritos. As the chips got closer to my mouth a pool of drool began to form at my feet. Finally I inserted the Doritos into my mouth and they tasted..good. (I honestly can't remember what I thought the chips tasted like, I remember having a positive experience, they tasted good. Either way that is not the point of this story). I crushed the bag in a couple minutes, most likely sharing the new found goodness with my roommates. Over the next few months I know that I indulged in the white bag at least a few more times. They weren't mind blowing, however I enjoyed them.

This is where a pleasant experience turns sour.

With the mystery bag there was a contest. Name the flavour, create a 30 second commercial and the winner gets paid $25,000. Sweet deal, I wasn't going to throw my hat into the ring but I couldn't wait to find out what playful and descriptive name would come out of this contest. Months went by and I was back at the trusty ol' sev' looking for a salty bag of deliciousness and what was that! A silver bag!! They named it...drum roll please...scream cheese.

I stared dead eyed into this sparkling bag of chips. What. The. Fuck. Are you kidding me, scream cheese. So these Doritos taste like scream? They have a heat of scream (which I distinctly remember they! did! not!)? Oh wait, I get it, it sounds like cream cheese and yeah, amazing word play! Doesn't matter that the chips taste like nothing close to cream cheese, they made a hilarious commercial around the name scream cheese! Give those mother fuckers $25,000 for being so fantastically witty. In all honesty, I have no problem with the commercial that was made for these chips. If they took the screaming concept and made it into a tag line along the lines of "so good they'll make you scream" or some bullcorn like that then actually named the chips properly it would have been acceptable. But as a consumer, I like to at least have a hint as to what I am purchasing. I purchased one small bag to make sure it was the mystery flavour, after that I boycotted scream cheese Doritos. I would rather walk around with a hat made of dildos than make Doritos Canada think it's okay to not only give your product a bullshit name, but pay the group of dickdoo's that came up with said terrible name $25,000. I would have rather seen Doritos name the chips poop and donate that $25,000 to charity if that was the best submission they received.

That being said, Sweet Chili Heat Doritos are one of my favourite chips. Win some, lose some I guess. My next post will be far more positive.

Stay hydrated,
Marc

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