An award-winning McDonald’s manager in Canada had a spotlight article written about him and the work that he does for the company by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. What should have simply a local interest story surprisingly went viral when, during the interview, the manager revealed that Grimace is…a taste bud?
Brian Bates, winner of the Outstanding Manager of the Year, explained that Grimace, the giant amorphous purple McDonald’s spokescreature is, “an enormous taste bud, but a taste bud nonetheless,” meant to show that McDonald’s food tastes great.
Now, you might think, “If he is meant to denote that the McDonald’s food tastes great, then why is he named ‘grimace?'”
That reaction has appeared frequently on social media since Bates’ interview went viral, as well as many people online just being surprised to learn this fact about Grimace period (a lot of “I was today years old when I learned that Grimace was a giant taste bud” posts).
The most interesting aspect of the story, however, is that it is not necessarily true, or at least not at first.
In 1971, McDonald’s introduced McDonaldland in a series of commercials designed as a sort of immersive experience for kids. In other words, there would be an adventure starring Ronald McDonald in the commercial and then kids could follow it up with “PlayPlaces” at their local McDonald (and with various displays at the restaurants and, when Happy Meals were introduced, then the characters played a major role in those Happy Meal merchandising, as well).
Grimace was one of the early villains of the piece (with the Hamburglar being the other main nemesis). He was called the Evil Grimace and he had four arms that he used to steal milkshakes and sodas.
After a year, two of the arms and the “Evil” part was dropped and Grimace was rebranded as Ronald McDonald’s simpleminded friend.
In other words, Grimace was simply a monster. He didn’t really symbolize anything. In the past, McDonald’s has said that he is the embodiment of a milkshake, but that seems just as much of an after-the-fact explanation as Bates’ “Grimace is a taste bud” explanation.
The “Grimace is a taste bud” idea is not a new one, and it is almost a certainty that Bates simply heard that version at some point in the past and believed it to be true and has passed it along as a fact ever since, and heck, Grimace could now be a taste bud “officially.” It just was not his original intent.
Source: CBC
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