So very true
Faced with ever-changing tastes and myriad choices even at the cheapest prices, food companies are eager to give their customers the next new thing — even if their customers aren’t quite ready for it.
Take wasabi. Three years ago, Brooks Broadhurst was certain that customers at Eat’n Park restaurants were ready for a new dish: wasabi-encrusted salmon.
Mr. Broadhurst, the senior vice president for food and beverage at the chain, decided to add the dish to nearly half of its 79 restaurants in Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Ohio.
It seemed like a safe bet. By that time, sushi was a staple in the nation’s supermarkets, as were products like wasabi mustard and wasabi mayonnaise. Wasabi had even been the refrain in a popular Budweiser commercial.
But at Eat’n Park, wasabi salmon was a flop. Mr. Broadhurst said he wasn’t quite sure what went wrong, although he did wonder whether the fish, with its pale green coating and pale green sauce, looked unappealing on the laminated multipage menu, especially next to the sundaes and pies covered in whipped cream.
“Sometimes you think it’s going to be a home run, and it dies,” he said. - New York Times, July 11, 2007
I think it's worth pointing out that the Eat n' Park wasabi crusted salmon died a sad sad death not because the world isn't ready for wasabi, but because the kind of people who like wasabi would never in their right minds order salmon at Eat n' Park. - Chow.com blog comment, July 15, 2007
posted at 12:39 AM
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