When your hometown is called “Fancy Farm,” people tend to remember the name.
Admittedly, it’s unusual….although it does sound a bit like a now defunct amusement park near Middletown, Ohio called “Fantasy Farm.” (When I attended the University of Kentucky, I got that joke a lot.)
But on the first Saturday in August, there’s no confusing Fancy Farm, Kentucky. Ask any local, state or national media outlet, and if they aren’t already there, they can certainly direct you.
The annual Fancy Farm Picnic is big news, and has been for 130 years. Politics, pork barbecue and great people, all gathered at the party of the year. Heck, it even made the Guinness Book of Records in 1978 as the Largest One-Day Barbecue in the World.
I was there.
Of course, I’ve been to a lot of picnics since I was five years old. Playing games and eating barbecue when I was little. Working in the ice cream booth that was my family’s responsibility. We’ve had class reunions around picnic time, and lots of family from out-of-town — the ‘city folk’ — coming to Fancy Farm in August for this one-of-a-kind experience.
It’s small town America at its best. Neighbors coming together, all as volunteers, working to raise money for the community church, proud of the tradition that generations of families have built.
And for the barbecue. And the politics.
That’s the heart of it all.
That’ll do, pig
While The Sticky Egg’s moniker is pure poultry, I have never attempted to hide my preference for pork.
I guess it’s really not that surprising for a girl whose home town (Fancy Farm, Kentucky) is in the Guinness Book of World Records for holding the Largest One-Day Barbecue in the World — that’s pork barbecue, my friend.
So I read with particular interest that the National Pork Board has changed their slogan from
“Pork — the Other White Meat”
to
“Pork — Be Inspired.”
Sorry, board members — I’m not.
Look — I appreciate the fact that you’ve stopped comparing pork to chicken. By now folks get the fact that pork is a lean, healthy — and let’s face it, tastier — alternative. And now you want to create a more emotional connection.
But I’m pretty sure a trite phrase like “Be Inspired” is going to elicit quite different emotions than you planned. Emotions like scorn. Derision. Boredom. All of which will lead viewers to first mock the lame ads and then, worst of all, ignore them completely.
At least the old tag line showed a spark of creativity. The new one sounds like it was penned during a ten-minute elevator conversation (although the dollars spent on its creation would probably make me cry).
National Pork Board: If you truly want pork lovers to “be inspired” in the kitchen, why not start by inspiring them?
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