Aunt Jemima Is Retiring And A New Look Is Here [Photo]
Download the WLZW Mobile App Now
I just recently did a poll about your favorite syrup, and although there were many different choices, Aunt Jemima got a lot of votes. According to WIVB, the Quaker Oats team said on Tuesday, that the Aunt Jemima brand syrup and pancake mix will be renamed to the Pearl Milling Company. The Aunt Jemima products will still remain on the shelves until June, then the packaging will be changed over.
Quaker Oats is a division of PepsiCo Inc., made the announcement last June that the company will be rebranding the Aunt Jemima brand because the character origins are, “based on a racial stereotype”. according to WIVB, the smiling Aunt Jemima logo was inspired by the 19th-century “mammy” minstrel character, which was a black woman content to serve her white masters. Nancy Green was a former slave who became the first face of the products back in the 1890s.
Last summer’s Black Lives Matter protest had a lot to do with Quaker Oats’s decision to remove the logo altogether. The company bought the Aunt Jemima brand back in 1925, they updated the logo in an effort to remove some of the negative stereotypes, but with all that has been going on in the world today, the company thought it was best to just rebrand the product. Other brands like Uncle Ben’s rice soon followed.
According to WIVB, Quaker Oats said they will donating $1 million dollars to groups empowering Black women and young girls, as part of the Pearl Milling Company rollout.
Black Lives Matter Art
Sign up to have news and information about your community delivered to your email.