Bulwark Takes - Cracker Barrel’s Glow Up Is a Glow Down

Episode Date: August 21, 2025

Sonny, JVL, and Hannah Yoest take on the Cracker Barrel rebrand, from the missing barrel man to the minimalist junk drawer décor. Is this about chasing Gen Z, corporate blandness, or American nostalgia gone wrong?

Hello, everyone. This is JVL here with my bulwark colleagues, Hannah Yost and Sunny Bunch. And we're going to break down the big news from today. Cracker Barrel, the beloved American institution has been ruined by woke. I'm kidding. It's not ruined my woke. But they made like a big logo change and we're all having a lot of freak out and feelings about it. Before we delve deep into what is happening at Cracker Barrel, the most urgent news of the day, hit like, hit subscribe, follow the feed because every once in a while, you'll get a fun. video like this instead of a video about the end of the republic. Hannah, when Cracker Braille debuted their new logo on Thursday, shares the publicly traded company plummeted 12%. So the market

doesn't like the new logo. Will you start out by telling me what your thoughts as a graphic design professional are? It's part of a larger trend. We keep seeing all of these heritage brands take a really iconic logo and then shift to we're going to we're going to capture the youth. We're going to outreach and get Gen Z in, like, in our stores with a new identity that is fresh and young. And it, it doesn't work. They, they have taken the figure with the barrel off and are now have like this shiny new. It's not even like, but it's, it's still, you still have like the classic font. It's still the same colors. There are, there are trace. Like, it's not a full departure like Jaguar. Like, you don't, you don't have like this huge.

huge departure, but, like, they are erasing, like, crucial elements of the logo that made it iconic and, and part of the American nostalgia thing that they were going for. Did you like the old line art man next to the barrel in the cracker barrel? Because I never, I just thought that was too busy in terms of, like, when you reproduce it, that logo had to be reproduced at a pretty big size in order for all the detailed lines in it to work. If you think about it, like, well, but where was their logo? It was on billboards, on road trips. So, like, for what they were, it worked really well because, like, you're driving down the road and you see this. Like, it's telling you what you need to know. Like, come on in.

We've got a good old Southern boy and a barrel of, you know. Crackers. Yeah. Are we allowed to say that it had a cracker and a barrel? Is that a lot? I don't think so. No, is that not a lot? Okay.

Uh, just making, just checking, just checking. Yeah, I got my joke. So, Sonny, what are your thoughts? Do you, do you like the new logo? It's very, it's punchy. Mm-hmm. I want to, I want to, I want to preface all this by saying that I always knew I was never a very good southerner, despite, you know, growing up. I was born, born in Arkansas, spent time in Florida and Virginia, spent most of my time, most of my time in Virginia growing up.

But I always knew I was never a very good southerner because I preferred I hop to Cracker Barrel. I was like, I was not, I'm not a cracker. guy, does nothing for me. You're globalist. Cuck. You like the international house of pancakes. Exactly. I want pancakes that remind me of France and a spagna.

Not Georgia or whatever. But no, so I was never, I was never a huge fan of the Cracker Barrow, but that had to do with its food. It was the food. I just didn't care for the food. I don't want food smothered and gravy and chicken fried, whatever.

It's not for me. it's not for me but the ambiance was always fine the ambiance was the best part of it because you would go there and they'd have those like little they'd have the boards with the pegs and you'd do the game and you have to like jump one exactly I loved loved all that stuff great great down home fun I for me for me I don't care that much about the sign redesign I saw that yesterday I was like whatever it looks fine it looks it looks I didn't I didn't have very strong feelings about it I was not like oh we got to keep the guy we got to keep We've got to keep the guy in the barrel. We need that. Bring back Cracker Man. The bigger. The bigger issue for me was, is the redesign of the stores. Like I, when you, when I saw the videos of the store, people like doing the 360 spin around, you know, the, the store showing what they look like now, I was horrified.

Because that is, that is. What do they look like, Sonny? Tell me. Well, if I had to describe it to you, I would, if you sat somebody down in front of HGTV and made them consume 10,000 hours of remodeling shows, and then you had that person find a team of OCD crippled individuals and said, take these junk drawers and rearrange them and put them on the walls. This is what you would get.

You would get like minimalist, minimalist junk drawers, which is, sounds like a contradiction because it is. It looks terrible. It's like they have on the walls, they have, I can't, I, the only way I can describe it, again, is minimalist junk drawer. They have like rolling pins, like 50 rolling pins on a board on the wall, but they're all perfectly organized like they had Rain Man there with a ruler making sure that they were all perfectly even.

And I, like, it actually, it actually makes me kind of mad to look at because I'm just like, who thinks this looks good? Now, this is part of my natural war against HGTV and they're kind of like gray tile remodel home aesthetic. That is what this reminds me of in many ways. But also it just, I don't understand who this appeals to. Who is the audience

for this? Is this, is this private equity? Did, like, when they brought in, so they brought in a new CEO to, like, what else changed? Is this? Because like, who appeals to? No, it's been publicly traded. I don't think. It is. Okay. But it looks like, it looks like the corporate

idea of what Gen Z likes. Like, it looks like the Pinterest Christification. Well, she's from, so the, so our, our new CEO, a nice gal named Julie Massino, long history in retail. She came up through Macy's and Starbucks and Coach and Godiva, interestingly enough, in her early years. But then she spent most the bulk of her career at Starbucks and then Taco Bell. So these, I would say this makes a little bit of sense. Right, a little bit of And she was previously CEO of a Los Angeles cupcake business. Do with that as you may.

And anyway, I can say I understand the idea because the old Cracker Barrel aesthetic. And here I'm talking about the retail portion of the store. And that's where they've been getting killed. So their retail sales since beginning their redesigns have gone down, even while their food and bad sales have gone up a little bit. it looked like a container ship from China just threw up inside the lobby of the cracker barrel. Like that was, I mean, the aesthetic was just chaos. Chotchky chaos.

Nothing in there actually costs more than seven cents to manufacture. And what it is is it's a trap for parents because your children, while you're waiting 45 minutes to sit down at a table to have a biscuit that costs $4, your children are wandering around saying, can I buy this? Can I buy this? Can I buy this? Can I buy this? And the stuff they want is a combination of toys are going to fall apart in five minutes and sugar products. They're going to make them vibrate while you're still trapped in the car

for 12 hours driving to the beach. So, I mean, again, I think I'm okay with redesigning in theory of the cracker barrel. The conceit of it was like the old country. So I pulled up the old logo and it's the old country store is in. the logo. And it's like, and if you look at it, the K, like, it goes up and it forms like a lasso around. So I think that like what they're actually going for is like the old main street you walk in and like all the Choshkis, the convenience of it. But, um, no, the way that they've described it is decluttering the interiors. Did they go through any, any retail item that did not

spark joy, they threw out? They maricondoed Cracker Barrel, which she's now, like, come back from that. Like, there's actually been a huge whiplash and, like, backlash against all of that minimalism. Like, Kyle Chalkia writes about this a lot, how, like, the global airspace and, like, the minimalist aesthetic has gone, is more globalist than, like, they are turning Cracker Jet or Cracker Barrel, excuse me, into. That's like the popcorn, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, into IHOP, basically, and making it more of a direct competitor rather than leaning into the heritage, which is an interesting choice. Given, like, our current political climate, you'd think that, like, here's our history, and we're proud of it.

I guess not. So you think Cracker Barrel has been conquered by the Wokes? Sunny disagrees with me, but I think maybe. I want to hear it. Give me, give me, give me your argument here, Anna. Well, if you look, so I've been thinking about it. And like, you know how the, there's that saying where all Americans think that they are temporarily, temporarily embarrassed millionaires. I think part of like America's refusal to deal with like the repercussions of slavery and all of this is that like it is a temporarily embarrassing part of our history that we don't really like that was just, that's not.

part of like the actual narrative of our history, but like it is. And Cracker Barrel was, I mean, thinking about it as like the Western country storefront kind of goes against the Southern identity that it actually has. Like in point of fact, it's from the South, but it's like pantomining a Western aesthetic. And like the two colliding is kind of awkward. But I don't know where to go Sonny, you are going to let them, you who are an anti-woke crusader are, we're going to let the DEIs off the hook for this. There is a, there's a long time saying on the left, and I get in fights with my film critic friends about this, that all art is political. And that is kind of what this, there's this, there's this kind of nascent MAGA movement on Twitter to be like anything, everything, everything I don't like is woke. And it's, and this is, you see it here.

And you see it, look, there, there is an argument to be made. made, right, that, like, think about the McDonald's rebrands, away from, like, playplaces and, like, you know, kind of colorful, wacky-looking chairs to, like, the more blocky, modernist, minimalist aesthetic. You've seen that a lot. You see this in Taco Bell, right? Taco Bell has gone from, like, the kind of, like, Alamo-style buildings, right, to the big. What I can only describe is, like, they look like modern apartment complexes, that kind of, like,

rectangular, uh, straight, like, and I prefer, I prefer the old taco bells. I like that. I like, I like the old playplaces. The question is, is this, is this a political move? You know, and there are arguments I have seen people argue that like, they want to erase children from public spaces. This is the, the, the woke single childless women are trying to do this, blah, blah, blah. And like, I, no, I don't, I don't think so. I don't think it's that. I really don't think it's that. I think it's just like, there is this idea. that people want clean lines and they want empty spaces. They want open floor plans, open floor plans. That's what we want. We don't want to, like, block people off with walls, and we don't want too much stuff in the way. We want them to be able to see all over the place. So if you're at the Cracker Barrel, you can conference with the table two, two tables over,

be like, hey, you're getting those biscuits over there? We're doing the gravy today? is I like that is that's the the feeling I get from this I don't think it's I don't think it's I don't think it's woke I just think it's dumb my point was that it was like it's a reminder though of the past like if you if you walk into a wood paneled like store that has the checkers set out and and the walls are decorated with cotton like it's going to evoke a certain song of the South Yeah. So maybe if you're a corporate person looking at the research, that, yeah, this is going to be a turnoff to Gen Z who is sensitive about everything. Let me read to you something that Julie Massino said at a conference not long ago. Everybody has a Cracker Barrel origin story, whether they stopped by Cracker Barrel on their way to Grandmas years ago and for Christmas or holidays or whether they were traveling for soccer. Everybody has a connection and a story. story, and they're always very emotional and a heartfelt. I'm sorry, is that true? Because my connection to Cracker Barrel is, that's the place you stop when one of the kids

needs a bathroom between rest areas. And it's like, that's all it is. Does anybody ever go to a Cracker Barrel when they are not traveling? Yeah, you're a Yankee. Does anybody ever go to Cracker Barrel except when traveling along the interstate? This is a sincere question. I do. I actually do have anecdotal data.

So, Alec is from, my husband's from Lumberton, North Carolina, and Cracker Barrel was the most popular place for these southern rural people to go to after church, because it was like nice-ish. No, I'm not kidding. My family, it was like, it's a saddest thing I've ever heard. It's a poor town. This is, this is, this is, this is, this is a, this is Yankee talk here. It's like a southern, southern northern divide here. You can't really be serious. And maybe a little rural, rural urban divide, too.

I don't even know how to respond to that I would look this is JVL this is snobb you're being you're being a little bit snobby right now that's fine that's okay that's all right this is safe space this is safe space so you can you can do that I would say I

I but I'm frankly again I'm more with you I was never a cracker barrel guy I when my friends and I would discuss like what we were if we were going to go to a diner style restaurant it would be like Denny's or I hop it was never it was never cracker barrel we never we never uh really were into that and i like i find her whole like sub don draper like the emotional connection that everybody has to crack come on cracker barrel like let's it's toasted yeah exactly exactly uh so i'm like i i i again i

i kind of i kind of uh i kind of shy away from all that but even if it's true even if you even if you even if that was, let's take it entirely at face value, that there is, everybody has this emotional connection that they have with Cracker Barrel, that they walk into it and they feel the feelings. Wouldn't you want to keep it the same? Wouldn't you want to try to emphasize that instead of being like, look, you've walked into a museum of horrors. You've walked into, you've walked into the ultra-organized kitchen of, of somebody who has never actually been, into a real working kitchen before. Like, it's, it is a, it's a, I don't understand, I don't understand having that idea

for the brand and then executing it this way. That, there's a disconnection there for me. Yeah, she's talking out of one side of her mouth and she's doing one, doing another thing. Like, she's just trying to sell it. But like, the research that they're going to lean on is going to be trying to get more foot traffic and the foot traffic is going to come from a different, different demographic than they currently are attracting.

And the current demographic that they're attracting. that they're attracting is going to be older people on road trips. Interesting. It's all so interesting. Do you want to hear my personal, my personal? I want to hear your emotional connection in your journey with the Cracker Barrel brand. My family did go to CrackerBill a lot growing up because we would drive so much. Like my grandfather was a truck driver.

And he, like, they loved Cracker Barrel. because, you know what they did? They used to, this was like in the pre-streaming error, Cracker Barrel functioned kind of like a library. You could check out. For audio books? So my grandfather would like, every time we would go on a road trip, we would go to Cracker Barrel and pick out books.

And that was like, we couldn't buy anything in the store because, again, it was like sugar hell, but we could pick out a, pick out entertainment for the road trip. Yeah, so you'd get your books on tape or your books on CD. And then you buy it for full price, but you can return it to any other Cracker Barrel and get like all but $3 back or something like that. Yeah. Yeah. So it was like the red box of audiobooks. Way like way before that.

Like I was like a kid and I remember us doing this. All right. Before we get out of here, I need your predictions. Does the Cracker Barrel re-logo design stand or does this get disappeared like the Gap rebrand? Remember there's a Gap rebrand? It went away. Yeah. It lasted like three days.

What do you guys think? I think this ends up standing. I think there's too much money invest. Or maybe what happens is they only do like a handful of stores like this and, you know, they leave some of the other ones the same. I'm kind of curious what, how broad this rebrand is. But I do think, I do think the sign rebrand will either stand as is or they'll have some sort of minimalist man with a minimalist cracker barrel with a, with a minimalist, you know,

like they'll have like a, I don't know, as you said, there's too many lines in that. There's, there's a lot going on there. Maybe something a little simpler, a little man with a little cylinder. So, Hannah, do you think they'll walk it back by just like introducing a secondary logo that is less extreme and then over time just balance you know uh like a b testing the secondary logo becomes the main logo and this one has disappeared where do you think there's a chance like three days from now this thing just it just goes belly up and they pull the plug on it no sunny sunny is right it's too much money it's 700 million dollar transformation plan like they're like I know

sunk cost fallacy maybe they pull the plug on it but like I think that like they're they're pretty committed to this and again and look at a brand like Jaguar that did the same thing where they like abandoned this iconic, beautiful, but complicated thing. The only hope I have for would be looking at a brand like Burberry where they, for a decade there, they did the whole luxury minimalist thing and they have completely scrapped that for returning, return to the classic crest and the horses and whatnot. I don't think, I don't have a lot of hope for it, the retail space though. I feel like that they, they're super, there's like the wokeification sensitive stuff I do think

will stand, which is tragic. Well, guys, there you have it. We finally got to do a fun video. We will return to the collapse of democracy at your regularly scheduled time very soon. Good luck, America.