Saturday, March 08, 2008

Luck of the Draw.

Variety Packs. A good way for the consumer to avoid a decision, and for the producer to off-load the gross flavors.

I don't know about you, but my variety pack MO has evolved over time.

When I was little, the variety pack was a shared resource. If I ever wanted Cheetos, Maple and Brown Sugar Oatmeal or the Chocolate Malt Carnation Instant Breakfast, I had to be thinking ahead, jockeying for position when Mom came home from Costco, and snapping up the good stuff at the first opportunity. Otherwise it was Peaches 'n Cream and Sun Chips.

This communal approach left the undesirables flopping around in their overlarge packaging for weeks, unconsumed. Finally, some martyr fell on the sword because we all knew Mom wasn't going to buy more until it was gone.

Now, I find myself (inexplicably) a grown up.

I have sole access and ultimate control over the variety pack. So my tactic has changed. I eat my least favorite flavor (i.e. the granola bar with raisins) first, knowing that its superior brothers and sisters will wait patiently in all their prepackaged and chemically preserved glory.

Most recently (let's just get down to brass tacks) that means I've had to muscle down three of these babies...

...before I can start on the Cheese and Onion.

Ew.

4 comments:

My Middle Name is "Gerous" said...

Oh.

Oh, oh dear.

I think whoever convinced ANYONE, let alone Walkers (I'm assuming it's the UK version of Lays) that Prawn Cocktail not only could, but should be an option for a pre-packaged snackable item, should get some sort of award. Maybe a gold statuette shaped like a turd. You know, Oscar's obnoxious cousin.

Anonymous said...

EW!!

Ew, ew, ew!!!

Carrie B said...

You have my undying and ultimate respect. It think that I would have either pawned them off on someone else at school or simply fed them to the neighbors dog. I just couldn't force myself to eat a chip that was "prawn" flavored. And I don't even want to know what the cocktail part of the equation is!

On a side note. Since you do have control of the whole pack (as in you were the one who bought it in the first place) why wouldn't you just go for one big bag of the good flavor?

Anonymous said...

i love this one, i laughed, i laughed a lot. love, L