John Harrison, Hiding The Fast Food Hurt

Hiding the Fast Food Hurt

As the creators of Burger King’s new Steakhouse Burger and Hardee’s new Thickburger fully embrace their traditional identities as taste bud friendly yet health toxic members of the food service industry, the minds behind one rather similar provider have recently launched a strategic effort to distance themselves from the rest of the fast food industry. Although a quick glance through Wendy’s entire list of menu options, and their corresponding nutritional values, would still appropriately yield the classification of stereotypical fast food joint, the latest advertisement campaign released by the company attempts to imply otherwise. Likely responding to the public’s growing awareness of the obesity crisis in America, Wendy’s Corporation recently released four new television commercials. Each advertisement employs tactics illuminated and explained by author’s Colson Whitehead and Vance Packard in an attempt to “hide the hurt” and establish a non-fast food aura surrounding what is, underneath it all, still very much a fast food restaurant chain.

In Apex Hides The Hurt, Whitehead focuses heavily on marketers’ never-ending struggle to disguise or conceal the undesirable truths surrounding a product by establishing popular and appealing facades around the product, no matter how phony and dishonest. The most direct and important illustration of such cover-up lies in the description of his unnamed protagonist’s injured toe:

His toe…was a grisly sight. The…stubbings had taken their cruel toll, and this morning the nail came off with the adhesive bandage…fresh blood seeped up out of the skin…but the adhesive bandage looked as fresh as the day he had put it on. The wound had been leaking blood, pus, whatever, but it had all been sopped up by the bandage…He put a new Apex on the injury. It looked as good as new. (Whitehead 150)

A rather unconcealed allegory, the bandage illustrates the ability of a clever marketing scheme to “hide” the unattractive qualities of a product for sale. The “blood, pus, whatever” are not healed or changed by the bandage, just as the actual product is not changed by the name or marketing techniques that are applied. The only changes in each situation are entirely external and appearance-related. Whitehead continues to illuminate this point during the conversation between the protagonist and his former boss, Roger Tipple. When the main character asks “‘What about, ‘Always be true to the product’?’”, Tipple answers rather bluntly, “‘Wise up’” (Whitehead 146). Here again, the author effectively demonstrates and satirizes the level of acceptance in the advertising community to sacrifice the “truth” of a product in order to sell it. However, this acceptance is defended by the protagonist in the early stages of the novel, where contrary to Shakespearean literary argument, he explains that “a rose by any other name would wilt fast, smell like bitter almonds, God help you if the thorns broke the skin” (Whitehead 5). Though these claims by the protagonist are of course outrageous- the actual flower would not change in the least - they convey the author’s pity regarding advertisers’ potential to skew the public’s perception of product truths.

The manner in which current Wendy’s television commercials are aimed at concealing the restaurant’s realistic, but perhaps decreasingly attractive, classification as just another fast food joint demonstrate this concept of “hiding the hurt” (Whitehead). First, the image and aura that the company once embraced but now wishes to detach itself from must be established. This poses little challenge, given that the typical, modern fast food commercial is undeniably familiar to the common consumer. Such advertisements consist of multiple, super-sized burger patties dripping with and coated in grease, smashed in between two sides of a bun, and enveloped by toppings such as bacon and fried onions that tumble off the sides. These burgers are usually shown accompanied by their long-time partners in crime, their value meal sidekicks: the hefty box of french fries and a towering cup of soda. The consumers, most often male, are constantly in a hurry. Though stereotypical, such an advertisement reflects a sense of acceptance of one’s place in the food universe, in that these companies are ultimately acknowledging that they are indeed part of the fast food industry - rather than, as Colson Whitehead would likely say, slapping an “Apex bandage” on that undeniable truth and pretending that their services fit the mold of some other brand of business.

Wendy’s, however, has recently adopted this latter strategy. In an advertising campaign compliant with the notions of Vance Packard and exemplified by the aforementioned satirical elements of Colson Whitehead’s novel, this stereotypical burgers-first, value-meal, dollar-menu fast food chain attempts to provoke the idea that they are much more than the brother of McHardees King – and that ultimately, they should no longer be classified as a fast food restaurant. Though this is utterly untrue, the advertisers present an outstanding case. For starters, there are a few common threads that pervade the ad campaign – none more obvious than the company’s latest slogan, “Its waaaay better than fast food. Its Wendy’s”, that concludes each thirty second spot. By declaring their superiority to “fast food” in general, the company simultaneously, indirectly declares that it cannot possibly be part of the collection “fast food” to which it is being compared. One cannot be better than oneself. This tactic exemplifies Packard’s claim in The Depth Approach that advertisers’ “efforts to channel our…purchasing decisions and our thought processes...take place beneath our level of awareness”

(Packard 3).

Another theme that strays from the normal fast food aura is the presentation of the product in the commercials. Atypically, none of the items featured in the new campaign – “fresh never frozen burgers”, “chicken go wraps”, and “premium fish fillet sandwich” – are ever shown accompanied by fries or a drink, though all three come offered in a value meal on the menu. This follows Packard’s idea that “appeals” in the world of consumerism are, as accomplished by the “Apex bandages” in Whitehead’s novel, often “hidden” from sight (Packard 5). Furthermore, with the exception of the “chicken go wrap” commercial, there is often an atypical sense that consumers are invited to be laid-back, hurry-free when they’re at Wendy’s. For one, the music chosen for the other three commercials is slow and peaceful – there is no sense of hurry. Likewise, the behavior of the characters reflects a slower, relaxed pace. In one commercial the woman slowly picks at her fish sandwich, eating it little by little. In another, a father and son sit down and joke around with one another over lunch. There is no sense of urgency that is otherwise typically associated with drive-thru service and order-at-the counter locations. This is much different that the depiction of working men wolfing down huge Hardee’s hamburgers during lunch break or the Burger King customer who impatiently crashes his car into another in order to more quickly order his Steakburger. This point leads into the strategic repeated use of females (thin females) instead of males in the Wendy’s commercials, which further separates the restaurant from the ordinary. In the advertisement for both the new fish sandwich and the chicken go-wraps, not a single man makes an appearance. Both consumers featured are women, as is the voice for the narration. Even the newly added animation of the red-headed Wendy in the sign cleverly implements her as yet another female character, rather just part of the logo.

The dialogue and narration of the commercials also support Wendy’s separation from the rest of the fast food market. Lines in the commercials such as “they’re not strips, like some other wraps”, “fresh never frozen…who else can say that?”, and “if you don’t know what it is, don’t eat it” result in the idea that Wendy’s is nothing like the other famous fast food joints, and that they lack the “pus, blood” (Whitehead 150) that in this case comes in the forms of frozen patties, strips instead of breasts, and mystery meat. Similarly, the conversation between father and son in one commercial is stocked with terms like, “vow”, “dedication”, “commitment”, and “promise”, evoking the ideals of, for example, a family-owned, small-time business – the way Wendy’s once originated. Attempting to portray themselves as such today, however, is a perfect example of the “manipulation” Packard refers to with regards to appealing to consumers in current society (Packard 5).

Writes Matthew Boyle of Fortune Magazine, “Two-thirds of American adults are now officially overweight, and the fast-food industry has been targeted as the primary villain in the obesity crisis...It has been slapped with numerous lawsuits on behalf of overweight kids and has been the subject of powerful polemics in the media” (Boyle 1). With the reputation of the fast food market plummeting as result of growing health considerations in this country, some quick eat restaurants have marched on, continuing to flaunt the “pus and blood” - the greasy, fatty, on-the-go monster burgers with the works that have made these companies so (in)famous. Wendy’s, on the other hand, has opted to “manipulate” (Packard 5) the public by “hiding the hurt” (Whitehead) of their product realities. Instead of an “Apex bandage” (51), advertisers have used a series of atypical commercial elements to cover the eyes of the consumer, and create the impression that Wendy’s has separated itself from the fast food industry.

Link to final two commercials: http://wendys.com/ads/

Works Cited

Boyle, Matthew. "Can You Really Make Fast Food Healthy?" Fortune os150 (2004):

Packard, Vance. "The Depth Approach." The Hidden Persuaders. Pocket, 1984.

Whitehead, Colson. Apex Hides the Hurt. New York: Anchor Books, 2006.