In yesterday’s this-is-so-stupid-it-hurts news, PepsiCo chief executive Indra Nooyi shared with Stephen J. Dubner, host of the Freakonomics podcast, that a girl version of Doritos was being developed. Although Nooyi explained, at length, what this project entailed, PepsiCo released a statement on Feb. 6 denying that any such project was underway.

In the cringe-worthy convo with Dubner, Nooyi matter-of-factly stated that “[boys] lick their fingers with great glee, and when they reach the bottom of the bag they pour the little broken pieces into their mouth, because they don’t want to lose that taste of the flavour.”

Women would like to do this too, Nooyi said, but they withhold the urge because they, “don’t like to crunch too loudly in public… and they don’t lick their fingers generously and they don’t like to pour the little broken pieces and the flavour into their mouth.

 

(Photo: GIPHY)

 

According to Nooyi, PepsiCo was set to launch Doritos that are, “low-crunch, [with] the full taste profile [but] not so much of the flavour stick on the fingers.” Also important to the team tasked with the arduous job of creating lady-specific chips is the ability for these chips to be carried in a purse, “because women love to carry a snack in their purse,” Nooyi said.

The podcast episode sent the internet into a tizzy of anger and disappointment.

https://twitter.com/NateWantsToBtl/status/960691009746169856

 

Even Ontario premier Kathleen Wynne chimed in to share her thoughts on lady Doritos.

 

 

Sooo… what’s the tea, PepsiCo?

Quick reminder that this comes less than one year after viral advertisement for Pepsi which featured supermodel Kendall Jenner. The commercial—which showed Jenner to crack a Pepsi and offer it to a police officer in the middle of what appears to be a protest—drew much controversy because it aired during a time of increased police violence against minority communities in the United States, seemingly trivializing a very real problem.

When asked about how the commercial even got to air, Nooyi told Fortune that, “this has pained me a lot because this company is known for diversity, and the fact that everybody who produced the commercial and approved the commercial did not link it to Black Lives Matter made me scratch my head. I had not seen that scene. And I take everything personally. The minute I saw people upset, I pulled it.”

You don’t have to be on the Forbes 500 list to see that the trouble Nooyi brings to the brand appears to outweigh anything positive she’s bringing to the table. Is she one strike away from being ousted?

https://twitter.com/JessicaValenti/status/960596569094610944

Filed under: Doritos, kissmornings