David Is Chang King (D.I… you get the picture)
3 Likes
I believe we discussed dried and freeze dried years ago!
2 Likes
Good memory! (And useful info, thanks!)
2 Likes
I’ve been using containers of crispy fried onions for a things ever since! Great product.
1 Like
Something of a reversal on the chili crisp trademark bullcrap Chang was trying to pull.
I’ve tossed the jar of his brand that I did own (it wasn’t my favorite of the ones I’ve tried) and you can be sure I’ll never buy another thing from Momofuckyou.
6 Likes
From the article:
Blockquote Momofuku’s new policy, as chief executive Marguerite Mariscal explained in a podcast with Chang on Friday, runs the risk that a larger company, such as Costco or Trader Joe’s, could sweep in and produce a similar product under the “chile crunch” or “chili crunch” names, effectively undermining the value of the trademark.
Doesn’t Trader Joe’s already market a chili crisp? 
5 Likes
As a PR person in an earlier chapter of life, I would counsel folks in companies to avoid saying or doing things that would reflect badly on the brand. I represented that they’d do well to avoid saying or doing anything they wouldn’t published on the front page of The New York Times. Today I’d replace NYT with “go viral.” We’ve all seen how stories blow up on social media.
I’m guessing that someone got overzealous—trademark attorney maybe?—in trying to stake out a broader trademark claim on behalf of the Momofuku brand.
4 Likes
It seems on brand for Chang.
I would think he is the one directing his attorneys to be aggressive. I didn’t see Lawtwitter talking about this too much, but I’ll post some tweets if I see anything interesting
The Simu Liu spiel will probably help sales for Mi La.
1 Like
Probably not the look he’s going for though, LOL. But in all seriousness, brands do pay good money to their marketing and PR counsel to cultivate a good image. Protecting brand goodwill can be at odds with some action a business wants to take, however. Likely we’ll never know the inside scoop in this situation—but it would make an interesting case study for marketing and PR professionals.
6 Likes
@tomatotomato It’s kind to transfer blame to an overzealous attorney, but Chang’s not an ingenue — they’ve been down this way before
4 Likes
I hear you. I didn’t mean to suggest that I knew the inside story. Rather that there are all kinds of ways this stuff can happen and go off the rails. Then the marketing and PR people typically get called in to clean things up.
4 Likes
Yeah, but that’s a first time “oops”
“Ssam sauce” was actually much more egregious 
4 Likes
From the article/podcast, Chang said “It can also be seen that we’re trying to squeeze people out of the space and have, you know, trying to be a monopoly and not playing nice.”
Umm…that’s exactly what what Momofuku was trying to do. 
5 Likes
6 Likes
Bit late, they’ve already positioned themselves as bullies.
Between this and Alexandres farm I’ll need to keep a list of avoidances.
3 Likes
Kroger, also. But they [edit - “they” = Chang & Co.] weren’t trying to stop anyone from selling chili crisp. They just believed (or claimed to have believed) that chili “crunch” was different and distinctive enough from chili “crisp” to claim rights in the “chili crunch” name.
1 Like
The discussion was on FTC got a bit nuanced and as in most cases it is most likely not always black and white but there are a number of bigger playersin the game who all want their “advantages”
https://www.foodtalkcentral.com/t/chili-crunch-trademark-brouhaha/16522
4 Likes
Too late, the damage is done and you know he only backed down because of the backlash.
The fact that he went there in the first place, and that it took so long for him to back off… yikes.
I liked Chang, this is beyond disappointing.
1 Like
