Enough is enough: the pumpkin spice craze
Looking around as you walk down the street on a fall day, the sights and sounds of the autumn are mingled, without fail, with the words “pumpkin spice”.
The flavor has lost some of its unique autumn charm due to this overuse. The name seems to appear in every possible location and starts to become a rather tiring sight.
During the fall, you can find almost anything in the flavor of pumpkin spice. From pumpkin spice Oreos to pumpkin spice tortilla chips to pumpkin spice hummus, if you can think it, it comes in pumpkin spice flavor. Some options, such as peanut butter, marshmallows, bagels and cream cheese, are slightly stranger. Extra gum, Planters almonds, Pop-Tarts, and Nestle Coffee Mate have all joined the pumpkin spice queue, sharing the space with many other mainstream brands.
There is such an overwhelming production of the flavor that the advertisements have started to have an opposite effect on me. Instead of wanting to purchase the promoted product, I find myself dismissing the ads as yet another identical company trying to use the same exact flavor as everyone else.
After its inception at Starbucks in 2003, the pumpkin spice mix has caused a recurring annual craze. However, Starbucks is not the only well-known company that makes the most of the public’s craving for pumpkin spice during the season. Brands and companies everywhere have adopted the flavor and promoted it so that everywhere you look in the autumn, you are bombarded by the word “pumpkin”.
Not only is the flavor everywhere come fall, but it begins to appear earlier and earlier every year. The Pumpkin Spice Latte at Starbucks is especially noticeable in this regard. The beverage usually appears early in the fall, however the drink appeared this year midsummer. Companies have become so obsessed with trying to muscle in on the flavor’s popularity that they fail to notice the fact that their products start to show up during completely random times, such as the summertime Pumpkin Spice Latte. This becomes increasingly more annoying every year. The summer is meant for cool and refreshing tastes like lemonade and iced teas, not the warm, heavy flavors of pumpkin.
I have nothing against the flavor, it is just the staggering amount of attention that it receives. The potential for fall flavors is simply so great that it’s a shame that the selection is limited to the one item of pumpkin spice.
