Monday, July 21, 2008

Wawa's Hoagiefest . . . changing the name game?

Wawa is expanding so much. Now they have a very aggressive marketing campaign promoting their $2.99 shorties. But its biggest effect could be to get you to call the sandwich a "Hoagie" and not a "Sub." This media blitz comes complete with Sgt. Pepper inspired art and a very catchy theme song on their website.



It all brings up a big question for me. In the areas of Ocean, Monmouth, Middlesex, Somerset and Hunterdon they definitely call it a "sub." But with all of these new Wawas there, could Wawa actually change their language? Could people in Red Bank, Hillsborough, Point Pleasant and East Brunswick use the word hoagie more often after this ubiquitous campaign? I see the vans and posters nearly everywhere south of the Wawa line. I also think our documentary has inspired t-shirts . . . . if we just had interns, I would have had time to come up with this:

Oh well . . . but if you have eaten at a Wawa in the past month . . have you called it a hoagie inadvertently?

PS - I am using Firefox's browser for this entry and its spell check does NOT recognize the word - hoagie . . there's red all over this post!

2 comments:

BackInBlack said...

Again, from Ocean County (LBI) and we've always called it a hoagie. :)

John and Lisa Howard-Fusco said...

Yeah, I get flak from Lisa about calling them hoagies. And forget it when we have the sprinkles vs jimmies debate!