| |
 Arby's
Oven Mitt - Talking quilted oven mitt and mascot for
Arby's, a Fort Lauderdale-based company with fast-food that is
"Oven
Fresh...Oven Good."
Called "goofy, assertive and a bit of a ham,"
the animated character named Oven Mitt (voiced by actor Tom
Arnold) hangs around (on a wall hook) in the kitchen area of
Arby's restaurants and gives motivational talks to the crew
members who prepare "Market Fresh" sandwiches. In one spot, Oven
Mitt mentions that an Arby's Five Star Club sandwich being
prepared smells delicious. But when one of the workers asks "How
can you smell without a nose," the suddenly aware Oven Mitt runs
screaming "My nose, where did it go?!" Later, we see the Oven
Mitt wearing a pair of novelty glasses sporting a large nose and
mustache. But then another worker asks "How can he hold the
glasses up without any ears?" and
panic ensues once again.
In other spots, the Oven Mitt sings
Volare
to Arby's Italian Beef n' Provolone sandwich or is shown being
coached by his personal trainer who encourages Oven Mitt to lay
on the counter and do sit-ups to build up his abs. Launched in
March, 2003, the $85 million
Oven Mitt ad
campaign (that touts the
idea that
Arby's roasts – not fries or grills – its beef)
was created
by WB
Doner & Company from Southfield, Michigan.
The
ad's tagline is "What Are You Eating Today?" An earlier Arby's
campaign featured the deep voice of soul singer, Barry White in
the role of Appetite Man.
TRIVIA NOTE: There
are 3,200 Arby's locations nationwide (compared to more than
18,000 for Subway, Arby's non-hamburger food competitor).
And, while Arby's won the
'Hot Again' award from Nation's
Restaurant News in 2003, not
everyone likes the Oven Mitt campaign. One site
called Oven Mitt "ugly and unlikable" while another
proclaimed
Oven Mitt as a cheap
(blatant) rip-off of Betty Crocker's classic Hamburger Helper
Helping Hand (a "bastard love child of the
Hamburger Helper hand and Grimace from Mickey D's").
In the spirit of "The Oven
Mitt from Arby's must die," one
web site went so far as to
sponsor a "F**K the
Oven Mitt" petition which began "We,
The Undersigned, believe that the Arby's mascot, Oven Mitt is
evil and all use of said mascot should cease immediately. The
idea of an amorphous, living, breathing oven mitt, while at
first bland and boring, becomes revealed as something so
unnatural, so abhorrent that any and all traces of its existence
should be wiped from this earth...."
The petition was written by Matt Waldron and
hosted at
http://www.petitiononline.com as a public service.
Still another opinion (Ethan2.0) at
http://www.campushook.com
revealed that the "creepy talking
oven mitt...terrified me so much that I destroyed my own oven
mitts just so they couldn't start talking; now my hands are
covered with burns.
Finally, one
http://www.blogspot.com writer expressed the sentiment "whoever
created the Arby's Oven Mitt needs to be pushed into a pool of
lemon juice and razor blades and left to die a horrible death." See
also - "Hamburger
Helper Helping Hand"
Distant cousins?
|
|
|
