“Religion in a Family is at once its brightest Ornament and its best Security.” —Samuel Adams (1780)
Unless you’ve been in a sensory deprivation chamber for the past week, you have heard that the CEO of Cracker Barrel Old Country Store, Julie Masino, launched a massive rebranding of more than 650 store interiors in 45 states, including a logo change.
It was a big decision because the livelihoods of more than 70,000 employees and their families depend on such brilliant edicts from CEOs. (Spoiler alert: The logo is back, but the logo was not and is not CB’s problem — more on that below.)
Now, you might be wondering: If Texas Roadhouse, Denny’s, or some other “family brand” restaurant were rebranding, would I write about that? Well, no, but let me explain why I am taking on Cracker Barrel’s CEO.
Cracker Barrel (CB) is headquartered up the road from us in Lebanon, Tennessee. It was founded by two local boys, Dan Evins and Tommy Lowe, in 1969. It has been at the top of the list of our favorite family restaurants since then.
Two decades ago, before mobile apps were available and GPS navigation was not on every phone, for our cross-country trips with the kids, we would take these foldable paper things called “maps” with us. On one of those maps were the locations of Cracker Barrels along our route — which became dinner stop destinations. Often, we chose hotels that had a nearby CB for breakfast the next day.
Indicative of CB’s customer base, on one trip in 2014, I parked my pickup truck in a highly visible area in front of the restaurant. I stepped out after all but my youngest son had exited the vehicle, and left my door open for him. Unbeknownst to me, he exited from a different door. We were in CB for an hour over lunch (a.k.a. “dinner” in the South), and when we returned to the vehicle, my door was still wide open — all of our luggage and day bags in plain view. But nothing, NOTHING, was missing. That is the CB customer base.
Of course, the fact that a substantial number of its customers in the South also carry concealed firearms might have been a factor.
CB is also the place where I taught my kids about tipping wait staff, regardless of how many stars were on their apron (if you know, you know). I don’t mean the 15-20% calculation; I mean the 50% calculation.
I taught them that at high-priced restaurants, where the check could exceed $100 per person, a 15% tip for four would be $60. But at CB, four can dine for less than that tip, yet the wait staff are working every bit as hard. The message being, TIP BIG on small checks in family-style restaurants.
Suffice it to say, we have been loyal generational customers.
So, when I first heard about the rebrand last week, I thought, “What in the gender-confused woke world of DEI is going on here?” I mean, I subscribe to the old maxim, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Moreover, if it is broke, restore it, don’t “trans” it.
Objections to CB’s rebrand launched a viral online culture war, and a lot of the pop criticism implied it was about gender/woke/DEI nonsense. Our Patriot Post memesters had a field day with CB’s CEO.
For sure, CB has gone down that culture-devolution path in the last 15 years, especially during the leftist tenures of Barack Obama and Joe Biden, and their Leftmedia platforms, so it was a fair assumption.
For a little background, the first time I ever wrote about the company was in 2014: “Cracker Barrel Ducks the Truth — Swiftly Regrets It.” At the time, its former CEO, Sandra Cochran, bowing to the gender-confusion cult, announced the chain was pulling down all of its Duck Dynasty merchandise because family patriarch Phil Robertson paraphrased a Bible verse when answering a question about his views: “Don’t be deceived. Neither the adulterers, the idolaters, the male prostitutes, the homosexual offenders, the greedy, the drunkards, the slanderers, the swindlers — they won’t inherit the kingdom of God. Don’t deceive yourself. It’s not right.”
This turned into a case study of a wealthy CEO not knowing her company’s grassroots customer base. At the time, the customer objections were so loud and swift that in 48 hours, Cochran ordered those items back on store shelves and issued an apology: “When we made the decision to remove and evaluate certain Duck Dynasty items, we offended many of our loyal customers. Our intent was to avoid offending, but that’s just what we’ve done. You flat out told us we were wrong. We listened. Today, we are putting all our Duck Dynasty products back in our stores, and, we apologize for offending you.”
That had to be the fastest corporate marketing reversal in history, and current CEO Julie Masino might want to dust off her bachelor’s degree in communications and read that apology.
Since then, CB has tried to get away with other woke gender nonsense. As fellow Tennessean Robby Starbuck notes:
Cracker Barrel has funded “all ages” Pride events for many years; worked with the far left HRC organization and reportedly sponsored HRC events for 10 years; brought an HRC representative to their Tennessee HQ to do pronoun and transgenderism training; sponsored the Out & Equal LGBTQ Workplace Advocate Conference and presented a workshop on how Cracker Barrel has made progress supporting LGBTQ+ causes; had Coming Out Day pamphlets passed out at their TN headquarters as well as pamphlets about supporting “LGBTQ YOUTH” and creating “Safe Zones” at work, free from “heterosexist comments and actions”; had pride flags at their corporate office and; had a Cracker Barrel employee on HRC’s business advisory council.
Starbuck went on to list some of the more egregious woke/DEI corporate policies CB has instituted.
But what really prompted Masino to push the panic button?
A quick look at what’s happening with the 10 largest family-dining chains based on systemwide sales is revealing. In most cases, it is clear since the ChiCom Virus pandemic that these companies are struggling to regain market shares amid big shifts away from family-style sit-down dining.
Cracker Barrel’s stock, which peaked four years ago at $170, is currently trying to rebound from $60, down from $72 just before the rebrand was announced. A year ago, the company started closing stores and reporting big losses.
CEO Masino, desperately trying to defend her decision, claimed last week: “Honestly, the feedback’s been overwhelmingly positive that people like what we’re doing. The feedback and the buzz is so good, not only from our customers, but from our team members.”
On her assertion, I gotta second this assessment by our friend Joey Jones: “The reverberation inside your bubble, that’s the ‘feedback’ she has.” Commentator Clay Travis concluded: “All of these companies need a director of common sense, and that is someone that actually consumes the product and says, ‘Hey, is this something that the base — that actually made this company exist — is going to support?’”
But I think the CB customer objections are more about the rebrand away from the traditions that have drawn them to the restaurant for years, which, by extension, is a catalyst for objections to CB’s gender/woke/DEI garbage.
Call it the Uncle Hershel factor. A family man of strong faith, he defined the “Soul of Cracker Barrel.”
For the last 50 years, Herschel McCartney was represented by the iconic figure on the cane chair, arm resting on the cracker barrel — before he, the chair, and the barrel were unceremoniously removed from the familiar logo above all the CB entrances, as part of the bland modernization inside and out.
According to the information still on CB’s site, also waiting to be removed:
Uncle Herschel was Cracker Barrel Old Country Store’s founder Dan Evins’ real uncle, the younger brother of Evins’ mother. He helped shape not only Cracker Barrel’s image but also its values. He was our own “goodwill ambassador” to the public. Uncle Herschel was a wealth of knowledge about what rural America’s old country stores were really like. He was a salesman for Martha White Flour Company for 32 years, traveling the rural South calling on many towns’ general stores. Like many Cracker Barrels today, the community general stores were more than just a place to purchase goods. They were a gathering place for folks to take a timeout from the chore-filled day to visit with a neighbor or two, exchange pleasantries or just talk about the weather.
Herschel spent many workdays traveling to these old country stores that were complete with cracker barrels, checker boards and rockers on the front porch. He was quite a storyteller himself and became a familiar and friendly face among the locals in many southern communities. After his retirement, Herschel brought the long-standing tradition of being a good neighbor to each and every Cracker Barrel store. He spent most of his working life bringing forth the important yet simple message of what makes a business successful — that people should be treated just as we would have them treat us. He was known throughout Cracker Barrel for his genuine sincerity.
In a lame attempt to keep Herschel’s legacy alive and well, Masino had the restaurants bring back a longtime hearty breakfast staple, “Uncle Herschel’s Favorite.”
Moreover, she issued a lame letter of apology, which read in part: “You’ve shown us that we could’ve done a better job sharing who we are and who we’ll always be. What has not changed, and what will never change, are the values this company was built on when Cracker Barrel first opened in 1969: hard work, family, and scratch-cooked food made with care.”
But customers were not taking the bait. In fact, Donald Trump got into the mix with a little business advice: “Cracker Barrel should go back to the old logo, admit a mistake based on customer response (the ultimate Poll), and manage the company better than ever before.”
After a reality check, on Tuesday, Masino announced, “Our new logo is going away and our ‘old timer’ will remain.” Guess the feedback was not “overwhelmingly positive” as she claimed.
It wasn’t a 48-hour reversal like in 2014, but a one-week reversal on at least the logo is pretty dramatic. Not sure who cleaned up on the short-sale long-buy flip-flop here, but I suspect it was Nancy Pelosi!
Again, let me offer this advice to Masino: “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. If it is broke, restore it.”
Neither CB’s logo nor the country store atmosphere is the problem.
The real problem is Masino’s corporate culture mindset. What she should be dumping is all the gender/woke/DEI effluent that has seeped into CB’s corporate culture over the last 10 years, and get back to basics — the “values this company was built on when Cracker Barrel first opened in 1969,” as Uncle Herschel set forth.
To that end, I suspect she has heard of another Deep South brand, Chick-fil-A, which has unflinchingly maintained its corporate values since founder Truett Cathy opened the first of his family’s now 3,279 stores in 1967. It is the highest-ranked company in America, and its customer demographic is the one Masino desperately wants.
Check ‘em out, Julie — if you need CEO Dan Cathy’s number, give me a call.
Finally, beyond all the corporate and culture banter, what’s by far most important to me about Masino’s errant concern about décor is the livelihoods of more than 70,000 employees and their families who depend on her decisions, and those of her board.
PS: Speaking of rebranding, the Democrat National Committee needs one badly! This week, the DNC passed a woke DEI resolution, and committeeman Bill Owen declared: “And to my Republican friends and fellow citizens … who profess to be active Christians, I remind them that DEI is the very foundation of the Christian church.” Pretty sure that is in Genesis.
Semper Vigilans Fortis Paratus et Fidelis
Pro Deo et Libertate — 1776
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