Just what every spouse wants: a goodnight kiss from someone who smells like a drumstick.
Have you ever yearned to lather your hair with Taco Bell shampoo? Or lift your arm to roll on an Arby’s deodorant? Tag line: We Have the Meat Sweats. How about McDonald’s mouth wash? Starbucks shaving cream?
It’s hard to imagine such abominations because those chains are not KFC.
Earlier this year, the chicken pusher announced it was moving headquarters from Kentucky to Texas. Since TFC conjures soccer, I’m assuming the company will stick with KFC. As an aside, did you know Chef Boyardee and Oscar Mayer were real people who looked almost identical? What is that all about?
The point: KFC has ventured into oral hygiene. This month, in partnership with Australia’s Hismile, the company released “Fried Chicken Flavored Toothpaste.” Shoppers were enticed with a pitch you won’t hear from Colgate: “Your smile just got extra crispy.”
I’m not sure how these marketers combine “like biting into a hot, juicy piece of KFC Original Recipe Chicken” and conclude with “leaving your mouth feeling fresh and clean.” It’s like cutting your hair with a weed wacker and dazzling strangers with that blood-free sheen.
Also, nine out of 10 dentists recommend you floss with curly fries.
The toothpaste sold out faster than you can down a box of Popcorn Chicken. It is also “fluoride-free,” which should give Robert F. Kennedy Jr. the crotch tingles.
I salute KFC for such timely forays into cultural irony. These are gloomy days. The world is fretting. Are we staring down a Great Depression? World War III? Also, why is everyone claiming Alex Ovechkin just broke Wayne Gretzky’s all-time goals record when the real all-time goals leader is Gordie Howe after you combine his NHL and WHA stats?
Wayne should have asked his buddy Donald Trump to deport Alex last month.
With fear and loathing in overdrive, the absurdity of fried chicken toothpaste is a blessed distraction from the possibility we may soon be brushing our teeth with mud and coat hangers.
The year 2016 was also a time of upheaval. Brexit referendum. Attempted coup in Turkey. Nuclear tests in North Korea that mostly terrified marine life. Trump was elected for the first time and now I’m forced to use a CPAP machine.
In between all of this chaos and uncertainty, KFC unveiled … edible nail polish.
“Simply apply and dry like regular nail polish and then lick — again and again and again to taste why the world’s favourite chicken is Finger Lickin’ Good.”
Does KFC headquarters have a torture chamber — it’s probably a giant steel bucket — where marketers are injected with gravy until they come up with a crazy idea to help bring the world some deep-fried levity during turbulent periods?
You can correlate the dates yourself. But see what bad news was making headlines when KFC offered a “chicken corsage” for prom season. Or when it got into the romance novella business with “Tender Wings of Desire.” Or when it brought back Colonel Sanders by putting celebrities in disguise, including everyone from Rob Lowe to Reba McEntire.
Today, a female Colonel would end up in an El Salvador prison.
When we were stressed out, KFC gave us chicken scented bath bombs. When the doomscrolling forced us to day drink, the gonzo marketers offered recipes for “KFC Gravy Cocktails.” There was a Colonel Sanders cat climber and Colonel Sanders pillow. When the news spiked to 10, a KFC fire log crackled and was scented with 11 herbs and spices.
In 2018, during a chicken shortage due to a supply chain snafu, the company was forced to temporarily shut down U.K. locations. The cheeky marketers apologized to customers by taking out ads in which the brand letters were rearranged — “FCK” — followed by, “We’re sorry.”
That was around the same time Trump launched his first trade war. FCK!
In 2020, amid the pandemic, KFC teamed with Lifetime to release the short film, “A Recipe For Seduction.” Mario Lopez starred as Colonel Harland Sanders in what the poultry moviemakers described as “full of mystery, suspense, deception, ‘fowl’ play and — at the heart of it all — love and fried chicken.”
Until the world returns to normal, if it ever does, every company should take a stab at whimsical collabs and ridiculous marketing stunts. I want to see Apple team up with Chiquita. When an iPhone costs $3,500, at least offer us an iOS Banana Split. I want to see Chrysler make us chuckle with a car freshener that smells like inflation and desperation.
KFC, do you have a secret stash of that chicken toothpaste? Send me a tube.
Minty-fresh does not matter if we are gargling with tears.
