I usually wait until someone’s had a spoonful or two before casually asking “You know what Häagen-Dazs means, right?”
Some people will pause and give it lots of thought, as if they knew what it meant at one point and the memory is almost within grasp if the right synapse fires.
Others will fabulate an explanation, confidently asserting that Häagen-Dazs is German, Norwegian, Danish, Finnish or Icelandic. The umlaut conjures up something vaguely Nordic when removed from the context of heavy metal bands, which seem to be obsessed with sticking it on as many letters as possible.
“Did you see Ülträŝláügĥʻtër Dööm at Black MëtälFëst, dude? They rocked out!”
Some people will just shrug and fess up to ignorance.
Depending on how invested the person is, I might invent something absurd before revealing the truth.
“Yeah, it’s German for ‘the moment when frosted perfection settles amicably upon your tastebuds,’” because we all love how German has words for some of the most obscure situations and feelings.
But nothing beats the truth.
Häagen-Dazs means absolutely nothing. It’s nonsense.
The now-famous ice cream brand’s founder, a Polish immigrant named Reuben Mattus, made the word up when he launched the business in 1960. He slapped an umlaut on it and added a nonsensical “zs” to give it an exotic, vaguely Danish connotation.
People won’t pay a premium for just any ice cream, but toss an umlaut in the name and claim it’s Danish, and suddenly customers are paying $3 or $4 more for a tub half the size, convinced that the Danes must know something about ice cream because their country is cold.
Score one for branding ingenuity and deduct another point from the American education system!
Sincerely,
Your friends at Pàin In The Büd
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