At the beginning of every summer in the US, college seniors compete for just a few prized positions: hotdoggers. A “hotdogger” is a promotional position with the Oscar Mayer company, which produces a popular brand of hot dogs, or weiners, and the most important part of the job is that the hotdoggers ride in and drive the Wienermobile!
The Wienermobiles (there are six) are vehicles heavily modified to look like giant hot dogs. The first Wienermobile was created in 1936 by the nephew of Oscar Mayer himself, but it was scrapped for the metal during WWII. Then in 1958 a new fleet was commissioned, designed by the leading industrial designer of the day, Brooks Stevens.
And just in case you’re wondering where I’ve been going with all this, today is Steven’s birthday; he would have been 122. Although the Wienermobile (which, by the way, is now supposed to be called the “Frankmobile) is clearly his greatest work, Stevens is credited with influencing an entire era of industrial design. And not only that; the robin’s egg blue color that was wildly popular in the 1950s came from Stevens too.
He designed trains, motorcycles (Harley Davidson motorcycles still use his designs), cars (including ones that didn’t look like food), logos, beer bottles, engines…practically anything that could be designed, Stevens did a version of. On the down side, he’s also credited with popularizing “planned obsolescence,” where companies make more money by convincing customers that “the new version” is much better than the one they already have.
In Stevens’ version of planned obsolescence, the old version didn’t wear out prematurely; you just wanted the new one because it looked cooler.
Although Stevens’ designs are usually sleek and aerodynamic (even when they’re kitchen appliances), sometimes he turned out designs like the Excalibur automobile of the mid-1960s. It was anything but aerodynamic; it was modeled after a Mercedes-Benz roadster from the 1920s. Stevens’ designs are still all over the place, and his influence was so huge that he’s probably the reason many products are “designed” at all. If you’re in the US, by the way, you can find a website with the Wienermobile (Frankmobile) schedule — there will probably be one somewhere near you this summer!
