Manic Pixie Dream Markets Are Throwing Themselves at Men to Get Their Attention

Men have discovered the grocery store; the revolution must change headquarters. According to a wild article in the Wall Street Journal, supermarkets across the country are changing things up to attract a hot new demographic: male dudes! That’s right, no longer will the men in your life have to waste away in their pizza-box filled apartments, mocked by their empty cabinets and their echoing pantries. Freed from the prison of having to do what everyone else has had to do for decades, men are flocking to markets like Lowes in the Carolinas, where “gourmet sausage stations” and “beer dens” suddenly popped up. Or Hy-Vee, which now puts weight lifting spreads on the covers of its recipe magazine. What do weight-lifting and recipes have to do with each other? I’d explain, but I’m chomping on this gourmet sausage.

The owner of Alfalfa Inc. is “working with architects to incorporate more of a male point of view into designs,” according to the WSJ and this ancient text I have that predicts the most satirical ways the world can end. Apparently, men like when they can see the exit (which doesn’t really jibe with the whole “men be shopping” thing but whatever). Additionally, according to the WSJ, “stores have even had requests for more-masculine floral arrangements.” So that’s a no to petunias and lilies and a yes to a bunch of testicles in a vase.

The idea behind all of this seems to be that men as a monolithic group have different shopping habits than women. This, of course, presupposes that grocery stores as they are currently designed have a female gaze in mind. That seems incorrect, according to my research in the field of The Way The Entire World Is Set Up and Run, but okay. When’s the last time you walked into a Target and thought, “Damn, this place has some deep estrogenic energy; better buy a lot of non-fat yogurt and never once look at the exit”?

But what do I know? I’m just a dude who was starving to death in my prison of manhood until I received an ad with a six-pack of chicken breasts driving a motorcycle over a volcano. Felt a little weird asking the cashier to ring up my breasts, but I’ll just chug a couple of bottles of this Vaseline Men’s Healing Moisture lotion and hope that the healing is for my cracked and fragile masculinity.

According to the Hartman Group, a food consultancy quoted in the article, “Men are making more decisions and feeling more empowered of the shopping that they are doing.” Men? Making decisions? Feeling empowered? Groundbreaking.

What a brave new world where, finally, something is going to cater to the needs and wants of a very specific group of dudes! Fellas, you’ve heard about Big Dick Energy, well come on down and get a load of this supermarket’s Big DEAL Energy. Shove a sausage in your face. Look directly at the exit. Literally take whatever you want. We’ve put out extra toilets so you could leave their seats up, too. It’s the golden age of men at last!

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