![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-66943-100x100.png\")
Good God!
In before the 'This site is really going downhill' posts. :D
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-462821-100x100.png\")
@quagmire0: This site is not sinking. This site is soaring. If anything, they are rearranging the deck chairs on the Hindenburg!
J/K, but I really hate this comment system.
![\"user-pic\"](\"/css/images/default.gif\")
I count 4. Anybody else?
@platoreborn: I still love Highlights... my daughter decorated my entire room in stickers from Highlights magazine.
@NikkiSweet: I definitely see 4, not sure about the 5th. The three in the inset, one directly above the rightmost face from the inset, and maaaybe another directly below. Are those the ones you see?
@Carencey: The 3 in the inset, the one below the inset and if you look just above the upside down broccoli to the right of the inset, there's another face.
It's people!!!!
What makes this food unacceptable (current tag for this story is \"unacceptable food\")? Do the broccoli actually have the faces on it, or is just a funny photo edit?
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-267895-100x100.png\")
@Dobernala: having several packages of this particular broccoli in my freezer i can verify that it is in fact NOT people, and is perfectly tasty broccoli.
@92BuickLeSabre: I happen to really like broccoli! Ditto brussels sprouts.
Funny anecdote- My younger brother *loved* brussels sprouts for years, having been mislead to believe that they were \"green meatballs\".
When he found out what they \"really\" were, he refused to touch them ever again.
Also- I refused to eat ketchup until I was 23. Demanded that my food be served without it, etc etc. After losing a bet I caved and had some on a burger. Turns out it's not that bad.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-16563-100x100.png\")
@Hanzo: I once told the kids I baby-sat that they were green, plant-testicles. After they ate them. Imagine the uproar.
Curiously, their Mom didn't hook me up for any return engagements.
![\"user-pic\"](\"/mt-static/support/assets_c/userpics/userpic-121198-100x100.png\")
@Hanzo: Yeh but it's really not that good either. I hate ketchup, I worked as a BK manager for 10 years and b4 that as an hourly employee for 4 years and while the ketchup in the bottles and pumps did not go bad, it did separate the tomato part from the oil and it smelled so strong that I have really not eaten ketchup since I started working at BK. And while I no longer work there, my desire to eat ketchup ever again has really not returned.
LMAO. I had a hard time finding the face in the original picture!
Damn, that's disturbing. One more reason for my nieces and nephews to refuse to eat broccoli.
Them: Noooo, there are people on my food!
Me: Well, appreciate their sacrifice and eat up. Smiles make everything taste better.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-246704-100x100.png\")
Oh god broccoli is people. I knew it, I just knew it.
There is NO way that is not photoshopped...
![\"user-pic\"](\"/mt-static/support/assets_c/userpics/userpic-298926-100x100.png\")
@TessWoodpecker: You say Photoshopped, I say work of God...
God, Jesus, Moses & Mary are all the people :p
![\"user-pic\"](\"/mt-static/support/assets_c/userpics/userpic-2352-100x100.png\")
Thanks Meg, That'll make salads all the more terrifying to eat.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-1485-100x100.png\")
reminds me of the pizza in Nightmare on Elm Street 4
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-126307-100x100.png\")
We now know the precursor to Soylent Green.
Dammit...beat me to the Soylent Green joke...
@ShizaMinelli: I was wondering how many posts I was going to read without a soylent green reference. hahaha
I bet this is some \"easter egg\" of the manufacturers, like, the faces are the founders of the company, or some farmers or something.
![\"user-pic\"](\"/mt-static/support/assets_c/userpics/userpic-74864-100x100.png\")
Hidden Photoshop shout out FTW....
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-184148-100x100.png\")
@MercuryPDX: I really hope the guy who did this sees that his work isn't going unappreciated. I think if your job is designing frozen vegetable bags this would be the highlight of your year.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-551073-100x100.png\")
That's effin' freaky! I don't want to look at it, but I can't help but to keep searching for more heads.
Why the hell are they so happy?! ARGH!
@Maglet: They're so happy because since they \"are\" the broccoli, they don't have to eat the broccoli.
This picture offends me. ;)
![\"user-pic\"](\"/mt-static/support/assets_c/userpics/userpic-363287-100x100.png\")
Brilliant. This could once again make broccoli \"cool\" enough to eat.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-398955-100x100.png\")
I wanted to make a joke about 'heads of broccoli,' but it doesn't work. Why couldn't they have hidden the heads in lettuce?!
I've been broccoli-blocked.
I rather not look closely at my hot dog packaging.
You think that's scary?
My money has the devil in it! And look at my grilled cheese sandwich! Just LOOK at it!
@shepd: I thought that looked like Marilyn Monroe on the toasted cheese. Hmmm....maybe she was hungry and decided to come back as warm , toasty bread and yummy melted cheese ;)
A package designer had some fun photoshopping in friends' faces.
@ElizabethD: It's funny, but if it's an employee, he/she is so fired, and if it's an independent contractor, they're about to get sued for a gazillion dollars.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-6173-100x100.png\")
@ElizabethD: I think it's neat too! It reminds me of turn-of-the-century murals in public buildings where the border of the mural is usually some kind of trompe l'oil painted frame, and they put faces and characters and things in the frame/border as well.
They renovated one of the buildings at my college that had a bunch of these and did restoration work on the murals. In addition to restoring all the original crazy hidden items, they added some more modern ones, like Kermit the Frog.
Sometimes you find these in newspapers ... 2-point white text hidden in a 2-point black border line is shockingly readable.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-488475-100x100.png\")
@Eyebrows McGee:
Seriously? That is really cool about the murals.
Where do you find this in the newspaper??
This broccoli picture is VERY weird.
@HogwartsAlum: I used to work for a newspaper so I got used to finding them in my own paper. :) It's a little bush-league so you don't really see it in major metro dailies, but sometimes in locals!
And yeah, seriously about the murals! I tried to find some pictures, but failed. But if you're ever on the campus of Notre Dame, they're in the entrance hallway of the main building. I was on campus when they restored them, so I read a lot about it, and they were comparing them to ones from the same time period in Chicago, etc. ... which of course I then went to see in Chicago as well. It's too bad I can't find pictures online!
@Eyebrows McGee:
That is totally cool \"Eyebrows\"! I work with graphic designers at a college, and now I'm plotting opportunities to slip a few extremely subtle and amusing visual easter eggs into things we produce. Bwahahahahahaaaa! (evil Halloween laugh) It's on, suckas! :-)
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-145489-100x100.png\")
Exactly what I was thinking. Just their way of \"signing\" their artwork! It is still a little creepy!
An old advertising technique using subliminal images airbrushed into ads to induce you to buy a product. Supposedly it is based on Freudian theory, and appeals to the unconscious mind. It is true. It happens in ads all the time. Women's and men's magazines are loaded with these. If you look with a magnifying glass, you'll see them in the ice cubes in whiskey ads, etc. A book written many years ago called Subliminal Seduction by a fellow named Keyes, I think, elaborates on this in much detail. If you don't think this is a real advertising technique... think again.
@bklynrickel: Subliminal advertising doesn't work. The whole field is based on a hoax perpetrated in 1957. See:
[www.snopes.com]
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-160506-100x100.png\")
@Orv: Of course, whether or not it works has no bearing on whether or not it's used. Advertising is a desperate field with many desperate people clutching at any straw to get that infinitesimal edge over the competition.
Agreed. I think they are convinced it works. That's why, for instance, it's in the broccoli.
Not so sure about that.
Creeeeeeeeepy!! I will never look at broccoli the same way again!
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-469529-100x100.png\")
PETA's already on the case!
Maybe they decided to include some of their staff's likenesses on the packaging this way. A little inside joke, if you will.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-273942-100x100.png\")
I make a ton of banner ads for my company. When I was playing Portal I started Photoshopping in \"the cake is a lie\" into some of the backgrounds.
No one ever looks at those things.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-54278-100x100.png\")
Soylent Broccoli is made out of people! IT'S MADE OUT OF PEOPLE!
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-149187-100x100.png\")
It's broccoli. It was terrifying before I saw the souls of the damned contained therein.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-222420-100x100.png\")
Where's Waldo?
Why are they happy about being eaten?
It reminds me of the happy pig at a BBQ place, why the hell is a pig so happy about BBQ? I mean a happy pig at a kosher place maybe....
/pointless comment
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-116137-100x100.png\")
wow, slow news day? :)
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-127871-100x100.png\")
i have this broccoli, but there are no faces:(
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-175610-100x100.png\")
I found this on the packaging too:
Soylent Green is made of people!!! It's people!!!
i find this awesome. a perfectly wholesome and harmless way to fuck with people's heads.
I used to design packaging for a major supermarket label, as well as a long stint with an advertising company that had major food labels in their client list. We (the designers) did stuff like this all the time. Our pictures and our names, we would hide them in the packaging design. Its absolutely amazing that whomever saw this...actually saw it. I mean...seriously...it almost (yeah, almost) never gets noticed. Except that one time. Then youre fired.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-83027-100x100.png\")
Wow, I just saw this earlier today in one of my Livejournal groups!
Must be a slow consumer news day.
Gotta say though, how many people looked at that package design before it made it to store shelves and never saw the little faces. Somewhere a graphic designer is laughing their butt off.
And that's why you steam it before eating. I'm going to start calling those raw foods people cannibals.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-24204-100x100.png\")
/obligatory
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-568700-100x100.png\")
I'm going to the store tonight to buy a package of that broccoli. i will report back later to confirm if it is real. This will probably bother me forever until I find out for sure.
That explains why broccoli tastes like crap...tiny decapitated heads.
\"Now enriched with Soylent Green\"
I know, a couple other posters beat me to the joke, but I had to do it.
I used to reference subliminal imaging in advertising as a joke, but then I read a pretty good book on it (read: not hysterical) and now that I think to look for it there really is more of it going on than you'd think there is... not dealing with the whole phallic object/mouth school of subliminals that most people get hepped up about, but little things like this: happy faces make the broccoli subliminally friendlier to your subconscious. Or something.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-68720-100x100.png\")
Would have been funnier if Waldo was one of the faces hidden in there.
I keep telling the wife we shouldn't eat it!!!!
the advertising/designers dept probably thought they'd leave their mark on what they created. standard practice for artists, not creepy or bad. Anyway, whoever spotted this had a lot of free time, didn't they?
SOYLENT GREEN IS PEOPLE!! IT'S PEOPLE!!
Can anyone tell who they are? Is one of them Louis Anderson?
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-52435-100x100.png\")
Too much negativity around here. This makes me more eager to bite into some 'ccoli spears. YUM
hm... I have Cascadian Farm broccoli in my freezer, but no faces on mine.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-156594-100x100.png\")
I just checked the package in our freezer. The label design must be a little different because I couldn't get the background details of the label pictured to match with what we have. I went over every little floret anyways, no creepy demon people observed.
Is it me or does that face on the package look creepily like Rush Limbaugh?????????????????
Some package design company just lost a client.
Anyone else notice that the faces are all smiling? I smell a subliminal message. I bet they did this to make their brand of broccoli more appealing.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-58864-100x100.png\")
thanks, i am now officially gonna have f*cked up dreams tonight.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-118641-100x100.png\")
Heh. Just some prepress geeks havin fun. Surprised they even resolve given the generally crappy quality of flexo printing on plastic film.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-342256-100x100.png\")
mmm soylent broccoli
heh, Organic brocolli :)
that is so awesome. Its probably the guy who made the graphic and his friends. How funny would it be to point that out.
\"Dan. Look at this.\"
\"...\"
\"See? Do you see yourself?\"
\"Oh man. I hope you don't get fired. But that is pretty awesome.\"
Subliminal Seduction, anyone?
Seriously, I read this book when I was a teen -- and woke up screaming. This doesn't seem like some photoshopper's cute joke to me -- IT'S EVIL.
Wait a minute.. Cardassians don't eat broccoli!
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-335709-100x100.png\")
Look REALLY close and there's a sign that says \"Thanks for the free ad space...suckers\"
Those are the souls of the migrant workers that died getting that broccoli to your table. You can tell by the smiles.
Yuck - I like broccoli but those pictures make it look like you are eating living creatures.
![\"user-pic\"](\"/mt-static/support/assets_c/userpics/userpic-542811-100x100.png\")
Way back in a High School Psychology class I did a paper on subliminal advertising. It was actually quite fascinating how many every day products used to use things like this. Normally things like naked women and the word sex are used to subliminally stimulate our minds but faces, death related words and other such things are also used. If you ever have free time it is quite an intriguing subject.
My only thoughts on this are essentially why? and then, that is so, so odd.
I was going to say, I feel raped. But instead, I'll say, I feel cannibalized. Better?
![\"user-pic\"](\"/mt-static/support/assets_c/userpics/userpic-82035-100x100.png\")
one of my friends totally found that like, 7 years ago.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-350835-100x100.png\")
shit... now every time my vegan friends come for dinner and explain that they don't eat anything with a face... I will start uncontrollable giggles... and have to carve the faces off their broccoli...
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-302597-100x100.png\")
What the hell were you smoking? I mean, I never sit and stare at the packaging that long...
They have been putting \"Faces\" in ads for a long time. Next time you see an ad for some kind of drink, try looking closely at the ice cubes in the glass - it is all a subliminal thing, kinda like what they do to you at the movies (ya know, they insert a frame of a picture of Popcorn and the next thing you know, you are getting the extra large with butter). Still really creepy to see those happy little broccoli people.
Looks like it is the founder of the company among others. Look at http://www.cascadianfarm.com/About.aspx
The founder is clearly one of the heads.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-104466-100x100.png\")
That's hilarious. I love it.
MY GOD, SOMEONE HELP THEM!
Oh wait, they're in broccoli. No one likes or eats broccoli. Carry on.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-174344-100x100.png\")
I think it's freaking brilliant!
... that is pretty freaking creepy...
The ultra vegans are right it is alive.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-398346-100x100.png\")
Photoshop makes everything better!
Reminds me of Soilant Green.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-19745-100x100.png\")
Reminds me of the Lost in Space episode where Dr. Smith runs into the Tybo the Carrot man!
Somewhere someone is enjoying is photoshop skills.
Meanwhile someone else is trying to find that guy.
Wow! that's Freaky! I have to go look for this at the market. My wife might scream is she sees it.
This proves Intelligent Design theory is hog wash.
At least they are smiling about the prospect of being eaten!
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-469860-100x100.png\")
Thanks for killing my liking of broccoli, Cascadian Farms.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-91229-100x100.png\")
Holy shit. I'm definitely taking a closer look at my broccoli next time. Even if it's just photoshop.
Soylent Gree-broccoli is people!
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-129219-100x100.png\")
BROCCOLI IS PEOPLE!
See this is why I never eat broccoli.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-435267-100x100.png\")
\"Soylent Green is people!\" ROTFLMAO
Am I the only one that thinks that face looks like Rush Limbaugh?
So that's what happened to the Jolly Green Giant ...
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-62073-100x100.png\")
Those are probably the people who work at the retouching studio. I'm not kidding.
Just checked this out at our local grocery store. These faces are legit. creepy. anybody know if it is the founders of cascadian farm? can't tell
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-152502-100x100.png\")
I think the brocoli folks had other inspiration
www.coasttocoastam.com/gen/page1756.html
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-373707-100x100.png\")
Soylent Green anybody?
Smiling faces sometimes pretend to be your friend
Smiling faces show no traces of the evil that lurks within
Smiling faces, smiling faces sometimes
They don't tell the truth uh
Smiling faces, smiling faces
Tell lies and I got proof
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-328859-100x100.png\")
that can't be real... can it?
Those have been there for years. I posted this at the original blog the day it showed up there:
I've actually seen these before. Around 7 years ago, my friend and I were incredibly high and wandering the local Safeway looking for something to eat. My friend, who at the time was the head purchaser of organic foods for another grocery chain, excitedly dragged me over to the frozen foods aisle to show me packages of not only broccoli, but corn and other frozen items as well, with teeny tiny little faces 'shopped in to very inconspicuous places. My friend dealt with the company regularly and he told me that they were the faces of employees and their children.
Months later, I would remember this experience while shopping with a new girlfriend. I dragged her over to show her the faces, but alas there were none to be found, and I was thought to be insane. I called my friend right there on the spot and he confirmed to me that the company had changed hands or management or something, and the little heads had stopped appearing.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-436602-100x100.png\")
I couldn't eat that for fear of eating some poor guy's face!
It's called subliminal attraction. Every person on this earth sees distorted faces in their dreams. Thus, when a person sees the same thing. very subtly. in an advertisement they spend an extra 3 to 5 seconds looking at it. That's enough time to catch the name of the brand or the picture of the logo. It's called advertising and it worked very well thanks to this site.
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-238651-100x100.png\")
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-199488-100x100.png\")
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-186777-100x100.png\")
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-297205-100x100.png\")
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-378539-100x100.png\")
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-404242-100x100.png\")
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-190860-100x100.png\")
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-126486-100x100.png\")
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-250592-100x100.png\")
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-524373-100x100.png\")
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-56339-100x100.png\")
![\"user-pic\"](\"http://consumerist.com/assets_c/userpics/userpic-504726-100x100.png\")
![[img.thesun.co.uk]](\"http://img.thesun.co.uk/multimedia/archive/00614/face_682_614472a.jpg\"){kind=link}
That is creepy.
@yashichi8bit: so obviously a deliberate and hilarious \"trick\" done by whatever graphic designer was working on this. Conversely, someone needed stock broccoli and failed to notice the faces.
@yashichi8bit:
Agreed Creepy.
@yashichi8bit:
OO OO OO does the real broccoli come with the faces also!
@yashichi8bit: Nothing to worry about, it's just a \"Serving Suggestion\".