Jun. 9—There was a time when, as a kid spooned breakfast Alpha-Bits or Sugar Frosted Flakes, the only accompanying entertainment was to study the cereal box. One just sat at the table and slurped and ... looked at the box.
Recognizing that fact, the cereal company marketing folks soon invented specific and amusing caricatures that consumers could associate with a particular cereal.
Tony the Tiger and "Grr-r-REAT!" Count Chocula and Franken Berry. The Lucky Charms leprechaun. That outer-space weirdo for Quisp. Sugar Bear, the smooth crooner of the Mose Allison-esque "Can't get enough of that Sugar Crisp / It keeps me goin' strong" theme. Wheaties, the "Breakfast of Champions," with collectible boxes featuring photos of different iconic athletes of the day.
Of course, Cap'n Crunch is probably the finest example of that strategy. I suspect many of us of a certain age — some of whom stopped eating cereal years ago — could STILL, on demand, draw Cap'n Crunch from memory with the realistic accuracy of J.M.W. Turner: The Cap'n's rosy cheeks, bulging madman's eyes, white handlebar mustache, epaulet-happy and gold-button-festooned Navy greatcoat, and the searingly blue, bicornic Napoleon-style hat with the yellow C designating either "Cap'n" or "Crunch."
Now, though, it's the other way around. Breakfast Wizards are paid large sums of cash to invent new cereals in support of an already established celebrity!
There are multiple varieties of Batman cereals, Sponge Bob Square Pants cereals, a Bart Simpson cereal, Avengers cereals, a Despicable Me cereal, a Scooby-Doo cereal, (race car driver) Richard Petty (!) cereal, Spider Man cereals, and on and on.
Which means food 'n' flavor researchers and chefs at the big cereal companies — General Mills, Kellogg's, Post, Quaker Oats — are assigned a newly-contracted celebrity endorser. Only then do they work feverishly to come up with a cereal that has a taste and texture — a FLAVOR PERSONALITY, if you will — reflecting the characteristics of the Famous Person about to have a cereal named after them.
My sources in the breakfast food espionage tell me that a sampling of in-the-works celebrity cereals include Bitty Bitter Bieber Berries, Kanye's Ego Crumbles, Steve Bannon's Sugar-Spangled Dandruff Flakes, Special K(ardashian), Ja Morant's Sure-as-Shootin' Shredded Wheat, Elon's Vanilla Muskeroos, and Joe Biden Cream of Extra-Bland Wheat.
Each box will be tantalizing and spellbinding to behold all through the breakfast hour!