Model Chrissy Teigen was quick to point out that 'the only quiet chips are stale chips'. Photo / AP
Model Chrissy Teigen was quick to point out that 'the only quiet chips are stale chips'. Photo / AP
Celebrities have piled in to mock Doritos after they announced they were considering launching quieter chips made just for women.
"Lady Doritos" were trending last night after Indra Nooyi, global chief executive of PepsiCo, which owns Doritos, revealed they were creating gender specific snacks because women "don't like to crunch too loudly in public".
The lady versions will be less crunchy and less messy, and come in a packet small enough to fit in a woman's purse.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the proposal has been met with much laughter and derision online as people suggest that Doritos may have missed the point of recent powerful women's movements such as Me Too and Rise Up.
Model Chrissy Teigen was quick to point out that "the only quiet chips are stale chips".
She later retweeted another user, captioning it "thank you" after they urged people to remember that such stunts also created "anxiety around eating", which could lead women to develop eating disorders.
Controversial comedian Kathy Griffin also took the serious point that women are often "told that they're too loud, take up too much space, that we're too much".
"If Doritos is actually doing this it'll just represent the BS women have had to deal with at home and at work. #CrunchLouder."
Most reactions to the news were deeply sarcastic.
One Twitter user joked that Doritos would be throwing in some other gender cliches with their snacks, such as bags with "inspiring slogans pasted on them like 'You should smile more!' and 'You'll never get a husband THAT way!'"
Previous Doritos commercials have made no secret of targeting female customers.
Many others were quick to point out that the chips brand had deeply misunderstood what women have been asking for.
"Good news ladies. We got a female Colonel Sanders and Doritis [sic] that don't crunch, so feminism is cancelled. We've achieved equality," one woman tweeted.
Several wondered if Lady Doritos would contain just 77 per cent of a normal bag, to reflect the pay gap and suggested that the brand may want to look at improving its own company, such as improving its parental leave and promoting more women to management, before it got involved in gender-specific chips.
As the backlash got stronger, several female customers said they planned to eat chips as loudly as possible in defiance.
One woman even joked that perhaps a reason the Dow was down 1150 points was "obviously because of negative consumer reaction to Lady Doritos".
One Twitter user questioned if the decision could be real - and another felt the decision to use "sexist stereotypes" was an advertising tactic.
However, one woman suggested an idea a way for the brand to use crunch-less chips - by rebranding them "cinema chips".
It's not the first time a brand has faced criticism for suggesting a women-only version of a non-gender specific product.
Bic pens were famously mocked for introducing the Cristal for Her range of pens, in pinks and pastels, that cost more than a regular pen but were smaller to fit in a woman's hand.
Doritos appear to be trying to backtrack on the comments Nooyi made on Freakonomics Radio last week.
She had said that the brand was "getting ready to launch a bunch" of products designed and packaged differently for women.
"For women [it's about] low-crunch, the full taste profile, not having so much of the flavour on the fingers and how can you put it in a purse. Because women love to carry a snack in their purse."
A rep for PepsiCo, which owns Doritos, told Buzzfeed today: "The reporting on a specific Doritos product for female consumers is inaccurate. We already have Doritos for women – they're called Doritos.'
"At the same time, we know needs and preferences continue to evolve and we're always looking for new ways to engage and delight our consumers," the rep added.
