Note: This post includes two videos that are essential to the story, so I strongly recommend that you read the web version, not the emailed version. — Paul
The National Association of Convenience Stores recently held its annual trade show in Las Vegas. I wouldn’t have been aware of this — in fact, I wouldn’t have been aware of the NACS’s existence — except that I noticed several people on the internet getting extremely excited about a product rollout that was announced at the show. The cereal manufacturer General Mills unveiled two new varieties of Cinnamon Toast Crunch — Cinnamon Toast Crunch Big Squares and Cinnamon Toast Crunch S’Mores Big Squares (see above) — both of which should be hitting grocery shelves in January.
I was a bit puzzled by all the commotion, probably because I came of age in the pre-Cinnamon Toast Crunch era. While growing up in the 1970s and watching lots of Saturday-morning cartoons, I was exposed to a massive volume of TV commercials for legacy cereals like Alpha-Bits, Apple Jacks, Boo Berry, Cap’n Crunch, Cocoa Krispies, Cocoa Puffs, Count Chocula, Franken Berry, Froot Loops, Frosted Flakes, Fruity Pebbles, Honey Comb, Lucky Charms, Rice Krispies, Super Sugar Crisp, Sugar Smacks, Trix, and a bunch more, which I tend to think of as the “real” breakfast cereals. (I can still sing the jingles for most of them.) By the time Cinnamon Toast Crunch debuted in 1984, I was already in college and no longer had my finger on the pulse of the sugary cereal market. So while I’m aware of Cinnamon Toast Crunch’s existence, I’ve mostly thought of it as one of those “other” cereals — brands that feel largely inconsequential because they came after the Golden Age of Breakfast Marketing (read: my childhood).
Shows what I know. Inspired by the response to the announcement of the two new varieties, I did a bit of digging and was surprised to learn that Cinnamon Toast Crunch is nothing less than a consumer juggernaut. Determining the “top-selling” cereals can be trickier than it sounds (some rankings are based on dollar sales, others on the number of boxes sold, still others on total product volume, etc.), but Cinnamon Toast Crunch consistently places among the top five. I had no idea, and never would have guessed.
Even more surprising, at least to me, is the revelation that Cinnamon Toast Crunch has evolved into an unusually broad-ranging consumer brand. Indeed, the deeper one delves into the Cinnamon Toast Crunch-iverse — or, as I’ve come to think of it, the Cinnamon Toast Crunch industrial complex — the more limitless it seems to be.
Let’s start with the current roster of Cinnamon Toast Crunch varieties, which stacks up like so:
Cinnamon Toast Crunch
Cinnamon Toast Crunch Waffle
Cinnamon Toast Crunch Peanut Butter
Cinnamon Toast Crunch Strawberry
Cinnamon Toast Crunch Loaded
Cinnamon Toast Crunch Minis
Cinnamon Toast Crunch Churros
Cinnamon Toast Crunch Rolls
CinnaGraham Toast Crunch
French Toast Crunch
Tres Leches Toast Crunch
Chocolate Toast Crunch
Reduced Sugar Cinnamon Toast Crunch
And those are just the current options. Remember, the two “Big Squares” varieties will be added to the mix this winter, and Cinnamon Toast Crunch has also had lots of limited-edition flavors, seasonal variants, and promotional tie-ins. All of that is fairly common in the cereal world, but Cinnamon Toast Crunch seems to have been more gung-ho about it than most other cereals. Here are some of the one-off, seasonal, or just defunct varieties that have been rolled out over the years (and I’m sure there are lots more that I missed):
Cinnamoji Toast Crunch
Cinnafeugo Toast Crunch
Frosted Toast Crunch
Cinnamon Toast Crunch Squared
Cinnamon Toast Crunch Blasted Shreds
Cinnamon Toast Crunch/Lucky Charms Mix
Cinnamon Toast Crunch Chocolate Churros
Cinnamon Toast Crunch Apple
Apple Pie Toast Crunch
Blueberry Toast Crunch
Gingerbread Toast Crunch
Sugar Cookie Toast Crunch
Caramel Toast Crunch
Dulce de Leche Toast Crunch
Cinnamon Toast Crunch Mexican-Style Hot Chocolate
CinnaFuego Toast Crunch
Cinnamon Toast Crunch Root Beer Float
Cinnamon Toast Crunch K-Pop Demon Hunters
Cinnamon Toast Crunch Totino’s Pizza Flavor
Ghost Protein Cereal x Cinnamon Toast Crunch
Aside from the impressive range of flavors, there’s something mesmerizing about the endless invocation of the term “Cinnamon Toast Crunch.” It’s such an unlikely-seeming product name — much more awkward than, say, Cheerios or Frosted Flakes — but it gains power with repetition, until it almost starts to seem like a religious mantra.
But wait — we’re just getting started.