Cracker Barrel Old Country Store serves comfort food in restaurants with a country feel and a general store gift shop. The stores define country with old tools, signs, relics, and curios all over the place in a large wooden-walled room that has the feel of a country barn without the smell.
Two of Cracker Barrel’s most important cultural signifiers have been removed. The new logo eliminates the old wooden soda cracker barrel (the source of their name) and their brand ambassador, seated in a chair next to it.
CRACKER BARREL CEO KILLS BRAND AMBASSADOR
Who is the man in the Cracker Barrel logo?
Artist friend Bill Holley’s sketch of a farmer in bib overalls wasn’t based on any real-life character. Instead, his inspiration came from founder Dan Evins’ description of the farmers he remembered from his childhood. Evins and Holley didn’t give their farmer a name. They just called him “Old Timer.”
The no-name farmer was later rebranded by Cracker Barrel’s marketing department as “Uncle Herschel,” the founder’s uncle
For those of you unfamiliar with the things that go on in marketing departments everywhere, a brand ambassador is a company’s face and personality in bodily form. Think about Colonel Sanders and fried chicken, George Foreman and his grills, Joe DiMaggio and Mr. Coffee, Martha Stewart and everything.
Over time, Herschel McCartney presented himself as Cracker Barrel’s goodwill ambassador
He liked strolling around residential neighborhoods handing out gold cards. Each card was good for a free meal at the Cracker Barrel, close by the Interstate Highway in Lebanon, Tennessee.
As Cracker Barrel’s brand ambassador, Uncle Herschel was a face and personality essential to the brand. The Cracker Barrel website calls him the “soul” of the company
Strategy: Eliminate the soul of our company from our logo. Skeptic: Why?
New logo: The farmer, chair and cracker barrel are gone, along with the words “Old Country Store”
Julie Cochran took over as CEO after stints at Taco Bell and Books-a-Million. Chief Marketing Officer Sarah Moore worked for 17 years at MGM Resorts International.
Strategy: Cochran and Moore plan to appeal to newer, younger, hipper customers (like themselves) without alienating longtime fans. Skeptic: Has anyone noticed that they’re trying to have their cake and eat it, too?
Claim: “It’s all about evolution with intentionality.” -Sarah Moore’s marketing-speak. Skeptic: Stanford University says intentionality arises from ontological and metaphysical questions about the fundamental nature of mental states. Is this really what you meant to say?
Claim: Uncle Herschel – the man depicted in the old logo – remains “front and center in our restaurants and on our menu.” Skeptic: Here are the new menus. Where’s Uncle Herschel?
Front and center means prominent
Uncle Herschel’s name is in tiny type on the front of the breakfast menu. It is just above center, but is in no way prominent. And if that’s not enough, he’s not mentioned at all on lunch and dinner menus.
The term “cracker barrel” eventually came to refer to simple, rustic informality and straightforwardness
Those were the characteristics of country stores and the conversations among rural folk that took place there. That figurative use of cracker barrel further reinforces the company’s brand identity, the external elements of a brand.
Claim: This (new) logo is a call-back to the original and rooted even more in the iconic barrel shape and word mark that started it all back in 1969. Skeptic: How about we place them side by side so you can show me how how the new one is rooted even more in the old one? Conclusion: The only similarities are the store name and the color families.
A brand’s identity is the sum of its visuals, values, and messages
A brand’s identity is how the company wants people to see their core values. It’s intentional signaling that affects how we perceive things and how we feel about them. A brand’s identity is much more than just a logo. It is the embodiment of how people see your brand and how its character translate into recognition, trust, and customer loyalty among consumers.
Let’s take a closer look at these two logos, side by side
The new logo’s background in no way resembles a barrel.
Claim: The irregular hexagon evokes the image of a wooden soda cracker barrel. Skeptic: In what ways does a stylized six-sided polygon express a connection to a rustic round wooden barrel? Barrels are round and vertical (portrait, kids) and the cheese blob is hexagonal and horizontal (landscape, kids). Conclusion: The new logo doesn’t seem to have a brand identity at all. All it is is a blandly generic YOUR NAME HERE logo against a complementary background color. The borderless yellow blob might be a rectangle with hips. Honey, does this cracker barrel make me look fat?
Claim: Cracker Barrel is our name, a cracker barrel is our logo, it’s part of our identity, and Uncle Herschel is our heart and soul. Skeptic: So your plan is to eliminate your heart and soul and his cracker barrel from the new logo, along with the words “Old Country Store?” Conclusion: Your new logo is only a store’s name on a funny-shaped piece of Velveeta cheese. Oh yeah, and why does it make me think of Golden Corral?
Cracker Barrel sold 700,000 rocking chairs last year, making them another part of the Cracker Barrel’s brand identity
Why aren’t they on the logo?
Bonus
Ray and Wilma Yoder are from Goshen, Indiana. Married for 60 years, they spent 30 years visiting every one of Cracker Barrel’s 645 stores. Mr. and Mrs. Yoder say “It’s nice when you’re out there driving that there’s a place that can be so much like home when you’re away from home.”
