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Pancakes So Good They’ll Make You Smile
For the first time in 20 years, the International House of Pancakes has a new logo! The Valhalla of after-bar-closing-time munchies, fluffy carbs, and sticky sucrose has introduced an IHOP red and blue mark that concedes nothing in glitz to uber-modern companies like Google, Citigroup, or Ubuntu and is about to show the American marketing world just how far the smile can actually be taken.
It is all just a little bit spooky.
The press release from the June 1 logo debut states:
For nearly 57 years, IHOP® restaurants have helped millions of guests each week start [or, let’s be honest, end] their day with a smile. Today, with the launch of a new logo that prominently features just that, the brand will bring those smiles to life….
[The new logo] exemplifies the iconic family-friendly restaurant’s commitment to continually evolve its look, feel and offerings to maintain its position as the leading restaurant brand in its category and stay ahead of trends to meet and exceed current guest expectations.
(Are there other restaurant brands in IHOP’s “category?”)
Beginning today, the new logo is prominently featured on the IHOP menu, website, mobile app, in advertising and on signage at select restaurants.
But that is not all. Oh, no. That is not all.
Patrons who can’t wait or who are not fortunate enough to live near the “select” restaurants can experience the interactive Multimedia News Release here.
Introducing the new symbol, IHOP’s Vice President of Marketing Kirk Thompson said (one assumes with a straight face):
Our guests have told us for many years that coming to IHOP, and in many cases just thinking about our world famous pancakes, makes them smile. We believe this new logo captures the essence of the IHOP experience, which consistently delivers our guests not only craveable food, but also great memories shared with family and friends.
Any man that can look you in the eye and say something like that is surely a danger to you and possibly to himself as well.
But wait. There’s more.
As those of you who have clicked through to the Multimedia News Release already know, IHOP’s menu now features a logo pancake.
As far as I can tell, the “multimedia” part of the news release is a video showing how this pancake is made. It looks very clever to me. But then all I can make is pasta.
Further details were available in the Montgomery Advertiser:
[IHOP] plans to underscore [the smile] approach with a “Summer of Smiles,” a series of events meant to celebrate people who “help bring smiles to their communities though their efforts to make a positive difference in the lives of others.” That kicks off June 25 with a free pancake lunch of the 6,000 attendees of the Kiwanis International Convention.
The other events were not immediately announced.
I have not made one word of this up.
It’s all a little bit overwhelming, isn’t it? As far as I can remember, the last organization that had such a humorless obsession with smiling was the one run by Sun Myung Moon.
Many organizations, like Amazon for instance, employ the smile in their marketing – and
for good reason. There is something deeply primal in a smile. As most new parents can tell you, babies as young as two hours old can smile. The baby, of 
course, has no clue what it is doing. But Mom and Dad just melt. Smiles transcend not only age but culture. People from all parts of the world express basically the same emotions with the same facial expressions – in particular by smiling. More on all this below.
But the IHOP smile mania is a little out of control. I believe the origin of this obsession can be explained with reference to what psychologists call “reaction formation.” Reaction formation is a “Level III or neurotic defense mechanism” wherein a person escapes a stress or anxiety producing stimulus by exaggerating an opposing tendency. And what, exactly, is the anxiety producing stimulus from which IHOP and its executives seek to escape, you ask? Well (best to put your browser on full screen here), it is something like this.
I think I can make that a little clearer by placing new and old against each other like this:
All of a sudden that old IHOP sign looks either a little menacing or just plain depressed. What exactly has IHOP been saying to us all these years? (And will IHOP design a “classic” IHOP logo pancake for customers who are feeling a little glum today?).
The new IHOP logo is, I think, very well designed. But there is such a thing as too much smiling.
Part of the problem is that smiles are fundamentally ambivalent. Smiles are not only cheerful and happy, but they can also be forced or evil or disingenuous or deranged. A smile can transport us back to that primeval time, recorded deep in our genes, when the exposure of teeth meant one thing: that lunch was about to commence…and pancakes were not on the menu.
If you want to do a “deranged” smile by the way, here is something you can practice in the mirror. First, put an angry glare on your face; lips closed, eyes wide. Now slowly, teeth slightly apart, smile widely but only with your mouth, leaving your eyes in glare mode. If you’ve done it correctly you should get a homicidal maniac…something like this.
You might also find that it’s actually difficult to maintain an angry look with your eyes while smiling broadly with your mouth. Your face just doesn’t want to bend that way. That’s probably a good thing.
Your brain, after all, has learned over your lifetime how to coordinate the 43 muscles in your face to suit the occasion. Obviously you can’t control each of those muscles independently, so for every emotion that you want to express your brain has to conduct a little muscle orchestra. Flutes, timpani, violins – they all have to be in harmony. From your brain’s point of view, putting on the maniac smile is a little like having the strings and winds play Vivaldi while percussion and horns do the Shark theme from Jaws. If it doesn’t feel weird, you’ve got a problem.
As for the smiles that are produced by a belt-loosening stack of pancakes, topped with strawberries and whipped cream and, oh, a little faux maple syrup too, please…and yes, some crispy bacon on the side would be nice. More coffee? Sure, why not? Don’t have to get up tomorrow anyway. God, what a night this has been! Those three girls were foxes, weren’t they?! Do you remember where we left the car? Better call a taxi anyway. Monday’s a holiday, you know. We can do it all again later tonight…
What’s not to smile about?
Published in Culture, Science & Technology
This is precisely the sort of thing that makes my Sunday night sleeps so restless.
Wafflehouse?
On a side note, IHOP may be ruined for me anyway. Stopped at one in Springfield IL in March returning from a trip to St. Louis. Without warning, my 5-year-old barfed all over the table. Then I grabbed him and made a mad dash for the bathroom (at the far end of the restaurant). I believe I actually yelled “Gangway” at one point. About 2/3rds of the way there he let go again, across the back of the legs of a waitress.
I’ve never tipped so heavily at a restaurant before in my life…
But on a “people really can be nice”note, as we were putting the kids in the car about 30 minutes later, a young girl, maybe 10 years old came up to us and said she hoped our little boy was feeling better.
Is it just me or does the smiley face have a nasty eye infection?
My thought exactly. That’s an enormous cultural divide. Personally, I prefer WaHo as the place to dry out. IHOPs are sufficiently antiseptic that they sort of sanitize a night of inebriation. When you’re at a Waffle House, it’s much more difficult to ignore how many bad choices you’ve made.
They don’t just serve breakfast foods. I dare you to try the Tilapia at IHOP.
Perkins, Denny’s, Bakers Square etc are all the same “category” as IHOP. And just about all of them serve the after bar crowd. Remember these places back before smoking bans?
I am sorry, after a wild night of debauchery the only acceptable place to eat is a White Castle, mainly because that is about all you can afford if you did it right.
Yes! I remember poker parties that ended at IHOP – flicking ashes into leftover eggs and pancakes. Indulge in the grunge!
Are you daring me because the tilapia is good, or because you want me to die?
When I graduated from college,my Dad gave me $500 dollars worth of IHOP stock. He told me to never sell it that they were the next McDonalds and could pay for my kids college. That was in 1967. By 1970 IHOP was bankrupt and my stock was worthless. Sometime in the eighties I received a notice that hidden assets had been found and if I filled out the paperwork,I would share in the proceeds. I did and they sent me a $1.37 . The current IHOP was an off shoot of one of the franchises.
I would not hire the guy who gave you the $500 in IHOP stock as my financial advisor.
Donald, it would be a long distance hire since he died in 1974. I still miss him but not his stock picks. I manage to screw them up myself.
The worst part about this logo is that when you are leaving the restaurant the sign painted on the glass door is a smiley saying HI.
Stop over-analyzing and eat yer damn pancakes.
JB’s are popular in the west. I think they are a version of a Big Boy’s, but not sure about that.
I spent a good deal of time doing math, writing stories, smoking cigarettes, and drinking coffee, when I should have been doing other things — like sleeping.
I can eat breakfast 24 hours a day, but I like to get the odd chicken-fried steak.
Here’s an interesting fact about me: I’ve never eaten at an IHOP or a Wafflehouse in my life.
I’ve never been in a Wafflehouse and if what they bring to mind is how antiseptic IHOP is I surely never will.
WaffleHouse is to IHOP
as
Motel is to Hotel
This post is what I love about Ricochet. Serious talk.
I just woke up, read this post, & have been laughing ever since.
I even practiced making the deranged smile. Looks good with bed-hair!
Thanks Lady! Want to post a picture?
A new employee where I work is all smiley and cheerful all the time. When she talks to me, though, I kind of feel like she wants to play patty-cake with me, or pinch my cheek (facial) instead of have an adult conversation.
In a Monday morning meeting, she started asking why everyone was so glum. It’s because it’s Monday morning. She felt like it was her job to cheer us up. It’s all so annoying and mildly oppressive. She should go find a tree to hug, and leave us to our Monday morning commiserations.
I’m good with that.
Somebody quote that video comment, and see if it autoloads. I may have fixed it.
Testing…
Or their life. There was an IHOP in the next town which was pretty notorious for being a place where late-night drug deals went bad and somebody would get shot.