The hustle? I can respect it. Cows—sick and tired of being a staple of the homo sapiens diet, not gonna take it anymore—harness rudimentary linguistic skills and start scribbling messages that implore people to eat more chicken. Except, of course, that the cows are lousy spellers, and their lettering’s a more desperate, beastly scrawl than legible, convincing communiqué. Yet the cows keep at it, clad in a variety of guises and uniforms that can’t hide the fact that they’re cows who aren’t interested in being our dinner.
This notion is at the core of Chik-Fil-A’s hustle, and it was amusing for the first five minutes. But lately the Chik-Fil-A billboards have started to give me the heebie-jeebies, the backdrops deepened, the markings more sinister and velociraptor-like, almost as if the billboards themselves are evil and demonic, like if the Chik-Fil-A ad was removed and a Geico ad took its place, the Geico Gecko would sprout fangs, horns, and a opaque pince nez while caressing a scepter. That was me knocking the hustle, because if you’re driving along on a highway, stomach rumbling, what’s more convincing: a gothed-out anthropomorphic tableau, or some doctored-to-the-hilt fast-food porn?
Look, all I’m saying is that it’s time for Chik-Fil-A to start exploring other options. Maybe venture into the business of doctored-to-the-hilt fast food porn. Maybe stage an avian revolution or sorts, or commission a mock “George Washington Crossing The Delaware” mural advert peopled with stern roosters, or scantily-clad chickens baking happily under heat lamps. Maybe a horde of mildly brainwashed children merrily and “playfully” giving chase to a fluffy Chik-Fil-A mascot. Maybe, like, breakdancing chicken—seriously, if chicken is what you’re selling, it’s okay to play up the whole chicken angle—or, say, a partnership with FILA where the whole ad is just a bunch of bored chickens lounging around in FILA tracksuits, like rappers or mafia dons. Just that, no logo or tagline. Anything’s better than what they’ve got right now.
