{"id":4288,"date":"2014-07-12T23:52:33","date_gmt":"2014-07-13T04:52:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/?p=4288"},"modified":"2014-07-12T22:17:25","modified_gmt":"2014-07-13T03:17:25","slug":"cupcakes-going-the-way-of-spuds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/?p=4288","title":{"rendered":"Cupcakes Going the Way of Spuds?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Here in the affluent suburbs of the United States, we live in a world of social trends — and not all of them wise or useful. Some of these trends are just trends for the sake of . . . well, for the sake of being trends. I.e., for giving people something to read about and then join in on and talk about with others. <\/p>\n

One trend from the past 5 years or so has been the renewed popularity of the cupcake. Cupcakes are nice treats for kids, given their cravings for sweet stuff; you get a lot of icing and other sugary stuff (like multi-colored sprinkles) relative to the somewhat less sweet (but still VERY sugary) cake within the peel-off paper lining. Thus a cupcake usually packs more of a sugar-blast than a regular slice of chocolate cake on a plate (unless you get a side piece with plenty of icing). And you don’t need the plate, so you can run around with it and eat it where ever you wish. A very good feature for restless kids. So yeah, cupcakes were the perfect kid’s snack (at least from the perspective of kids themselves and their dentists). <\/p>\n

Adults generally don’t crave cupcakes as much, being more reasonable and sedentary. But we reasonable adults are also subject to occasional bouts of nostalgia for the days of our youth, back when we did love our cupcakes. And we are also suckers for a good social trend to get involved with. In the early 2000’s, some money-hungry business people finally made the cupcake connection, and the adult gourmet cupcake craze took off. I read that it had something to do with the show Sex and the City<\/a>, whose story narrative included a bakery where sexy urban women would occasionally indulge in . . . you guessed it . . . cupcakes. That is, when not indulging in other sensual activities (cupcakes were sensual and also ultimately frustrating, given the body fat that cupcakes deposit).<\/p>\n

One of the front-line cupcake purveyors was Crumbs Bakery based in New York City. They expanded from a local neighborhood bakery to almost 80 retail locations and had extensive on-line sales. But, sooner or later a one-trick establishment based on a fad has to reach the limits of growth, and then deal with contraction. Business people used to fast growth aren’t so good at riding out contractions, and Crumbs turned out to be a prime example. A few weeks ago, Crumbs decided to shut all its stores<\/a> and lay off all its workers.<\/p>\n

Bloomberg had a good article<\/a> on the fall of the cupcake. They found an analyst (Peter Saleh from Telsey Advisory Group) who summed it up quite nicely: \u201cPeople are not going to eat a cupcake for breakfast . . . It\u2019s not a very sustainable business model where people are going to come in and eat the same thing every day. You eat a cupcake every day, and you\u2019ll be dead.\u201d<\/p>\n

Back in the 1980’s, there was another one-item food craze, based on potatoes. For whatever reason, Americans became willing to stop at a food counter and order up a hot baked potato loaded with rich toppings such as melted cheese or sour cream plus other good stuff like chili or bacon. Some of the fast food restaurants like Wendys put spuds on the menu, but there were also quite a few \u201cbaked potato bars\u201d to be found in shopping mall food courts. (This is back in the days before Amazon and Ebay, when you wound up spending a lot of time at malls). By 1990 the baked potato trend went to seed, although there may still be a few potato places surviving in odd locations, such as this one<\/a> in Portland, OR. Ooops, wait \u2013 this place bit the dust<\/a> in 2010. <\/p>\n

Oh well, we’re now living in a time when carbohydrates are the enemy, diet-wise. And potatoes have a lot of carbs in them (although various food authors agree that the potato itself, without all the fattening accoutrements, is not all that bad<\/a> nutrition-wise) But with regard to empty carbs, sugary treats like cupcakes are like nuclear warheads by comparison. So, another trend may soon bite the dust \u2013 it wouldn’t be a real trend if it didn’t, eventually. <\/p>\n

And yet, cupcakes might not go out without a fight. Looks like some investors are showing interest in keeping Crumbs alive<\/a> on a smaller level (and with a more diverse product offering). And for now, the lights still seem to be on at the local cupcake shop (Sweet Lane<\/a> in Clifton, NJ). Here’s a pic of their neon cupcake window sign shining in the night, a tribute to another social fad that may (or may not yet) be on the way out.<\/p>\n

\n

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Here in the affluent suburbs of the United States, we live in a world of social trends — and not all of them wise or useful. Some of these trends are just trends for the sake of . . . well, for the sake of being trends. I.e., for giving people something to read about […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25,5,23],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4288"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4288"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4288\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4290,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4288\/revisions\/4290"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4288"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4288"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4288"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}