Supermarket Sweep – A Nostalgic Fallacy or At Least It’s Not Shop Till You Drop

We all had favorites as a child. It should come to no surprise to anyone who has read this blog, or knows me for even less than an hour, that my favorite is Darkwing Duck. In an era where superhero cartoons were everywhere, including the critically acclaimed Batman animated series, Darkwing was far away the best half hour of the week. When you think about it, Darkwing is just a better version of Batman anyway. He has way better side kicks, isn’t a brooding mopey jerk, and the feather count is completely one sided. Does Batman even have feathers? I rest my case. Batman’s only benefit is not having Honker on his show. I’ll admit that’s a powerful argument, but not enough to tip the scale.

My obsession with Drake Mallard (Spoilers!) didn’t stop when I became an “adult”. Again, you read and listened to these posts. He makes he way into about a quarter of the material. I mean, Darkwing has nothing to do with Supermarket Sweep, yet here we are, again. I even have a stuffed Darkwing, courtesy of Maid Megan. I received him this year. No, I don’t feel shame about this. In fact, here’s a photo to brag.

How good did that look! If you a member of the merry men, expect your current and future children to all be receiving one of these as a gift. This is not a joke. One loyal (hopefully) reader recently had a daughter and she has a Darkwing all to herself. This is the highest compliment I can give.

But lord help you if I give your children a Peppa Pig plushie. That’s the world’s biggest FU. I would take less offense if somebody spit in my food while I watched. Tread lightly in the comments, dear readers, or you might be stuck with a British pig for a long time.

Ok, we cleared the Darkwing and Peppa references early. The rest of the blog should be original.

Original-ish.

Nostalgia is a powerful crutch. Many of things we hold dearly have a special place in our hearts because of nostalgia. Things we grew up playing, watching or enjoying as children likely aren’t as good as we remember it. We remember things through rose colored glasses – we enjoyed them, so they must be good. I remember receiving the Space Jam video game for the original Playstation and loving it. Looking back, that game was a watered down NBA Jam with even less unique dunks. That game was dipped in Nostalgia, deep fried in child innocence, and covered in a popular charcter tie in sauce. Sadly, it only served 1 disappointed 32 year old.

That last sentence didn’t work but I had to keep going with the word play.

Recently, I watched a few Darkwing Duck clips. I had to test this Nostalgia theory. I won’t lie, I was nervous. It pains me to say this but I have to admit the following:

I don’t think I appreciated Darkwing Duck enough. If anything it’s better now than it was when I was a child. What a classic program that suffers no Nostalgia boosts at all*¹. I mean, the characters are great. Darkwing himself is a greatest super hero of all time (not close) and his villains are up there too. Even Bushroot. Frigging Bushroot is good! I give this show 14 starts out of 5. When there’s trouble, call DW indeed.

So sure, not everything we enjoyed as kids were only good because we were young and remember it foundly. Some things were, you know, good. I think a few of these successes were a complete fluke, but so be it. Unfortunately, for every Darkwing Duck, there’s at least 50 Nostalgia fried disasters. One I’m afraid to admit, is Press Your Luck AKA “The show that yells out No whammy, no whammy stop!”

As a child, I remmeber watching hours worth of Press Your Luck, to the point where I think it was my favorite show to watch. I loved how animated the contestents were. Sure, the dialogue wasn’t Spakespearian, but they were passionate, yelling the same four words over and over. The true standout were the whammy animations. When these poor, unfortunate souls landed on the whammy, they were forced to watch a quick animation where these little red knock off oompa loompas would take their entire bankroll. Imagine having to pretend to be calm when this happens. Here’s reality drama done right. The fact that the Whammies hasn’t had several murders on set is a modern marvel.

Recently, Press Your Lick was revived, because what hasn’t been revived yet? As part of ABC’s Sunday night Game Show block, the show was renamed simply Whammy, and kept all of the old gimmicks, plus a new way for the winner to rack up money at the end. It was an excuse to pad the run time for a full hour. Hearing this, I was extremely excited. However, after watching a few episodes, I quickly realized my love for the show as a child was because I liked the little cartoons. As a game show, it leaves a lot to be desired.

Press Your Luck or Whammy, is strickly a luck based competition. This isn’t much of a surprise as most game shows are, but Press Your Luck takes this to an entirely new level. To build up spins, you’re asked a series of questions, ranging from embarrassingly easy, to tricky for the sake of embarrassing an early bussing contestant. If you don’t buzz in first, you can answer based on a series of multiple choice questions and get an easy spin. There’s never been a tough question asked.

The game itself is assigns random dollar amounts based on button pushes. As the contestents do so, they are forced to say “no whammy” and “stop”. All of that personality that seemed to be there as a child was painfully manufactured now. I did not enjoy.

Before you ask, I did go back and watch the older episodes, just to make sure it wasn’t just the reboot. They’re no better. The only difference is the button presses to stop the “wheel” weren’t randomized, and I remember hearing about a crazyed man who memorized the patterns to win like $200,000. I mean, that’s cool and all, but that’s barely buying a mid class house in today’s dollars. If that was your big get rich scheme, maybe try a heist next time.

Honestly, the best part of the show remains the contestants not raging after seeing a taunting cartoon call them stupid based on a random result. If there’s a Youtube compilation I’d watch.

The reason I bring up nostalgia, and even give an example should be no surprise, but I think a lot of people will disagree with me. Nearly everyone I’ve talked to mentions Supermarket Sweep as one of their favorite game shows of all time. People rave about how awesome the ending competition was, where three teams race through a semi real supermarket, filling their baskets with various meats, cheeses, and diapers. Nobody knocks this portion of the show. To be honest, it’s pretty creative and a highlight, though not without flaws (we’ll get there).

It’s nostalgia that blinds the average person from remembering what an absolutely train wreck this show was for 27 of its 30 minutes. We remember people frantically racing down aisles, but we don’t remember how they earned time to shop. This portion, 90% of the shows air time counting commercials, is where the flaws pile on. We’ll discuss these at length.

How do I remember all of these flaws so well? Amazon Prime has dozens of episodes from 2 of its runs back in the 90s and early 2000s. That’s right, the show was revived after an early 90s run. You’d think a lot changed from the early to late episodes, but outside of the items being plugged as a commercial, and the overall cost of groceries, everything is basically the same, including the host. Honestly, I doubt there’s another American alive more suited for this blog. It is my honor, nay my duty, as a proud citizen, to provide you a list of the reasons Supermarket Sweep low key sucks.

Reason 1 – Contestants

I suppose this is a flaw for most game shows, but this is a significant issue in every episode of Supermarket sweep. In the few dozen episodes I’ve watched,** ² the only memorable contestants have been the ones who’ve completely failed on the games or during the sweep. I don’t think there’s been one charismatic contestant in the show’s history. There was one player who was extremely energetic and perky, but honestly, she might have just been an average person who seemed off the wall in comparison. I’m confident Supermarket Sweet requires each contestant to take at least one Sedative before appearing on set. And by 1, I mean an IV bag full.

The show does nothing to help out these mouth breathers. After their big entrance where the contestants are chosen at random based on the product they hold, the next time they get any spotlight is for their “interview”. This is where the host asks the contestants what they do, and one of the members of each team gets 30 seconds to tell a story. Here’s some examples.

“One time, I was in a shoe store and I had forgotten shocks so I couldn’t try on the shoes”

“I used to play baseball in high school. Well, not so much play than watch it on TV. And my watch, I mean I played RBI Baseball on Nintendo.”

“In college, my BO was so bad, I had to shower at least weekly.”

Ok, so these weren’t real quotes, but I couldn’t think of any of the stories the contestants told. You know why? Because they all absolutely sucked. On the rare occasion somebody says something truly interesting, there was no follow up. For instance when one contestant implied heavily they worked for the CIA, they immediately went to the next team. Seriously? Nothing after that? Is your product placement bullshit more important than being entertaining? I suppose so.

The teams sometimes have unusual pairings, the most interesting thing about these dullards. On average, one of the three teams are married. This is the biggest shock of all- to think these contestants could find someone equally unappealing is baffling. You’ll get some couples and college friends who had nothing better to do as well. There’s was also a very unusual nephew/aunt team ups and awkward co workers pairs. I’m pretty sure one co worked team had hooked up the night before and reeked of regret the entire show.

There was even a human and bear team that crushed it until the human did not buy the allowed five honey jars and was mauled onscreen. That epiidoe didn’t make it to syndication sadly but if you listen closely, you’ll find some references to it.

In summary, the contestants for Supermarket Sweep had the personality of a rock with half the brains. Yet, they seemed like rock stars compared to one, very crucial person on the show.

Reason 2 – The Host

Boring and uninteresting guests are bad, but a good host can navigate through even the dullest of players and get some entertainment out of them. Unfortunately for Supermarket Sweep, the host, David Ruprecht is less interesting than some of the products he pushes. In one episode, a box of cake mix took over as host in a segment when Ruprecht went to the bathroom and nobody noticed a difference.

In the early 90s version, they tried to give Ruprecht some material. He would open each episode with a joke, that was not so subtle product placement, and nobody would feign laughter. Then at the first commercial break, he would provide a “fun” fact about another product that paid for the advertisement space. The facts could have been interesting, but Ruprecht read the que cards with the skills of a foreigner who’s never seen English in print. The level of cringe was off the charts, yet somehow, people kept tuning in. Well, until they had to reboot the show a decade later, but that’s semantics.

During the reboot, these jokes and fun facts were removed entirely. My guess is the network knew that Reprecht was a God awful host and gave him as little to do as possible. Boy did he give them little back. The real question is, why didn’t they get a new host? I mean, a cardboard cutout would be more vibrant and entertaining. My theory is Ruprecht was the nephew of a network big wig and got the job as a favor. That’s the only explanation. Maybe he was the contestant who was mauled by the bear and hosting was part of the settlement. Trust me, the speculation is the only interesting thing about this man.

Even overlooking the difficult responsibilities of reading a teleprompter, Ruprecht’s limitations are obvious. Part of the reasons the contestant’s seem uninteresting is the host can’t hold a conversation, reacting to truly interesting possibilities the same as boring ones*** ³. If you asked me to describe the host’s personality, I don’t think I’ve have anything. Maybe poor dresser? But that’s about it. I get that game shows like safe choices for their hosts, especially in the 90s, but man. This guy would make Mr. Rogers look controversial.**** ⁴

Problem 3 – The Games

Now, in comparison to people sprinting around with shopping carts full of hams, most word games would seem bad. However SuperMarket Sweeps questions are low level word games that involve trademark brands. Each episode has some variation of a scrambled product name, a poor word association game, and guessing a product off of clues. There’s only so many ways the show can do this, and I get they don’t want ot rip off the Price is Right… but they should have ripped off the Price is Right. As least their product placement is entertaining. I mean, LeBron stole Plinko without shame for “The Wall” and nobody seemed to care.

Each episode starts with a 30 second dash. After a rhyming question is answered, one contestant much find the specially marked product and bring it back to the host. This can earn up to $100, a surprisingly huge advantage. I don’t have an issue with the game so much as the host awkwardly touching the contestant each episode. It’s not inappropriate, but does he need to touch every runner’s back? Id much prefer him take a few steps back and give the contestants some boring encouragement. Maybe an “attaboy” or “attagal”. Seems like something sweater boy would say. This is, by far, the best game the show offers pre sweep, and that’s a problem cause it’s a 2 out of 10.

The most awkward competition is when the teams get thirty seconds to give clues and reveal a product name a la Password, but much worse. This really highlights how awkward most of the contestants are, giving borderline incoherent clues. Of course, some of the guesses are even worse. Usually the teams manage to scrape by and get the product, but there’s been a few where the team guessed the product name wrong despite having all by the last letter. It’s a true embarrassment. Again, this is one of their standout games.

I could be lazy and mention the “guess the price game”, but it would just lead to an angry Bob Barker picture. Let’s avoid it and move on.

In each game, the teams get separated, and half of the contestants are off screen. There’s literally no point for this. Even funnier, in the 2000s version, this only happens once. That’s right, half of the contestants don’t get any screen time for the first half of the show. Who made that call? Why wouldn’t they, you know, work as a team? Otherwise,just have 3 contestants. We could have prevented a regretful hook up! Other than the stupid guess the words to spell a product game, there’s no point in the multiple competitors per team. Glad nobody thought this through.

Finally, Ruprecht regularly mentioned that they had developed new games in each episode of the 2000s. Most episode went on not having anything new. They played the same sucky game every episode. In fact, the only new game from the 2000s is “Movies” where the contestants have to guess movies instead of products. First, this isn’t even new, but repackaged. Secondly, what do movies have to do with a supermarket? This is admitting your show is boring as sin and trying to hide it with something interesting. I blame the host. I like to think he invents these games by himself because if this sho had a creative team, they should be ashamed.

In my head, Ruprecht invested the Movies game while down an aisle of Blockbuster, thinking “Here’s a business model that’s going places”

Issue 4 – The End Game

Now, I don’t mean the actual sweep. I’m talking about the portion of the show after the sweep. The winning team can win $5,000 if they can follow clues to three products.

The idea behind finding three products in a 60 seconds is fine. My issue is the clues. Half of them make no sense. Now, is part of the issue the two decades between the premier and my viewings? Yeah, probably, but that’s not funny.

The first two clues rhyme, cause why not make things more annoying. Occasionally, these are stretches but usually, it works. then, when money is on the line, all hell breaks loose.

Instead of giving straight rhyming clues like the first two rounds, the third clue is so convoluted I can’t even explain it. I’m going to try an example, but it’s probably bad

“You’ll be happy to know this product is a picker-upper”

And you’d have no idea what the heck it’s supposed to be till you run out of time. Then the host would let you know it’s Glad Trash Bags, and you’d pretend to understand, but you don’t. You’d feel empty and ashamed, not because you lost, but because now you need to have a conversation with the host where he gets to be smug.

This happens on most episodes. I don’t understand why they decided against fair clues. Maybe the network was running out of money, but the winners would only get $5,000, plus their sweep totals. Even in the 90s that’s not insane cash. At least give people a chance. I guess the Executives were just mean spirited at got a kick out of other’s failure. Contestants left the show dull and still poor. It’s a tough life. At least they got to run up and down super market aisles to win less than their flight and hotel costs.

Ok, that’s enough filler. Let’s talk about what everybody wants to hear.

Supermarket Sweep Shopping Strategy

We all have fantasies. You can admit it. But one I’m sure all of us share is the Supermarket fantasy. You know the one. I’m embarrassed I even have to type it out, but just in case you’re unsure, I will.

Let’s say you’re at the supermarket doing your grocery shopping. Everything seems like a normal trip until alarms begin going off. You think you’re in trouble, and to be fair, you did pocket a few pounds of salami from the deli, but then you here over the intercom that you’ve been selected for Supermarket Sweep! What an honor. In this scenario, you skip out on all the awful selection of games we discussed, and the host is Dave Chappelle, who switches into various Chappelle Show characters every 30 seconds.

But again, this is a common fantasy so I don’t know why I’m explaining it.

What would the strategy be? Well, there’s a right way to stock your cart, and a pathetic way. Sadly, 99% of players on Supermarket Sweep play the game incorrectly. It’s like playing Smash Brothers and not using Duck Hunt Dog – you’re doing everything wrong. Fortunately, as a frequent SuperMarker Sweep viewer, and a Duck Hunt Dog main, I can teach you how to win Supermarket sweep in the very likely event you’re a contestant.***** ⁵

Special Items

Much like this show in general, most of these special items seem like a good idea, but they’re not. There’s a cost vs benefit to each of them, and while some have too much upside to pass up, many of these should be entirely ignored.

Coffee – For wasting over 40 seconds, you earn $100 to grind a bag of coffee. This is where you can determine who’s good at shopping and who’s a sucker. For the time alone, it’s not worth it, but then you have to stand in place grinding the coffee, as if any spills, you are penalized. In the time it takes to finish the coffee, a contestant should be able to rack up $250 easily. That might be a low estimate honestly. I openly mock anyone getting the coffee. If you considered the coffee a good strategy, I think less of you as a person. This is like picking a kicker in the 3th round of a fantasy football draft.

Candy – This is like picking a kick in the 7th round of a fantasy football draft – better, but extremely embarrassing. You have to get a pound of candy, with only .02 pounds of wiggle room (in other words, you can have .98 to 1.02 pounds). This isn’t as easy as you’d think. Plus, if anything spills, it’s a penalty (allegedly. It only came up once in the near dozen episodes I’ve seen). Plus, this is another time burner. For the $100 you get, you could have tripled it, you know, shopping.

Jelly Belly – For $100,this is on the fence as worth it, but at least this is just scoops instead of weight. This makes things better. You do have to remember the required flavors from the very beginning of the sweep, so even though it’s usually only 2 flavors, and 3 scoops total, you’ll likely have to pass if you don’t tackle this immediately. It’s easy to forget. Personally, I’d start here.

Bread – This is very similar to the Jelly Beans, except for whatever reason, they make this harder, requiring 4 different types of bread, and in various amounts. What, is this the challenge mode of the Jelly Beans? Unless you know exactly what you’re looking for, I’d pass. Wasting time trying to remember various breads might be how the host spends his free time, but not me.

Magazines – This one is just like the the bread and jelly beans, but it’s worth $250. You have no choice but to do this. It does seem time consuming to pull this off without a little luck, but if you’re efficient, this is a huge advantage. Honestly, how do they come up with the values for these things? $250 for magazines but $100 for Jelly Beans? I just don’t get it. If I was a contestant, I’d hope this wasn’t part of the competition.

Blow up Bonus Things – These giant, novelty items, which look like inflatable pool toys, range in value from $50-$250, though you won’t know until the end of the run. This is an no doubt addition since you can pick one up while shopping and have no delay. 

Manager Special – There’s 3 versions of this one, and each requires luck to be worth anything. Sometimes it’ll appear in a discount display filled with cans. It takes some digging, which isn’t good. You’re on a clock and can’t be wasting time trying to find one can. Not ideal unless you happen to see it and get lucky. Sometimes, the host will announce a clue with about a minute to go in the sweep. That’s a complete waste. The clue, as expected, sucks a fat one. You don’t need to waste time deciphering the rambling of a plain, boring man. It’s probably about basic finance or bad tie shirt combos anyway. The last possibility is hitting the button on three separate monitors, a complete waste of time unless the one clue gives it away. Even if this is worth $250 (the price seems to fluctuate based on the episode), I think it’s a waste of time that you could be racking up on meats.

Can Stacking – In the 2000s version, a can stacking event was added to give the teammates not running something to do besides hopping around in an ugly sweater. If the runner gets a bag of cans to their teammate, he or she can stack the cans in a pyramid for a cool $100. There’s no reason not to do this, especially if you filled your cart up early. Plus, put your lazy teammate who’s afraid to sweat to work.

Now that we got that out of the way, we can finally discuss strategy. This isn’t hard, but sadly, I have never seen this happen. While you’re slugging your way to the special items you can’t avoid, grab everything you can. Other than the 5 item limit, there’s no restrictions. Too many times, people will skip over mounds of items to find the one they want, carefully stacking their carts with “expensive” items. Sure, that works but why not add a haul of other items on the way? This seems obvious, but people don’t do this. Are they afraid they can’t count to five? Based on what I’ve seen, I’d be fearful of their accounting skills as well.

Otherwise, you need to make sure to pick up your floatation device bonus, your meat and cheeses, and everything else under the sun. If the good bonuses, like the magazine take too long, you might be in trouble. However, if you’re loading up constantly, and not picking and choosing you should be fine. Also, if you think you won, grab some produce as a taunt. Nobody’s ever done this, and they are certainly plastic, but I still would. Winning with grace is boring. If any show ever needed some pizzaz, here it is.

The biggest mistake you could do is to be like one contestant, we’ll call Al. I forget his real name, but I do remember the second worst contestants name, Ken. Ken failed to crack $550 with nearly 3 minutes to shop. I don’t know how he showed his face in public again. But he was frigging Superman compared to Al. Al went for the coffee first, so I started rooting against him nearly immediately. Then, he went for the candy. Finally, he stopped by the bread. By the end of the run, Al had four items, and not one standard grocery. It was offensive. Al was penalized a few dollars for spilling candy, but we all know it was because he was a jackass.

Never be afraid to be yourself, unless you’re like Al. If that’s the case, immediately become someone different.

It’s been announced that Supermarket Sweep is coming back with Leslie Jones as the host. Somebody interesting and funny? My goodness. This is the host that the show needed for years. Maybe the show will take off this time, much improved from the past flawed versions. Then again, will the show have a contestant under the age of 55? How many contestants will be confused by aisles and demand to post mate their order instead? Will somebody confuse the point of the game, and try to get the lowest total possible? With millennials, I’d expect nothing less. All I ask is that when you hear the beep, think of all the fun you could have on supermarket sweep. Honestly, it’s not much. Maybe they should revive Stump the Schwab instead.

1. *If anyone disagrees with this sentiment, I will fight them in a parking lot of their choice.
2. ** Don’t judge me. This is over several months’ worth of time. Like you’re so productive when you get a few down hours on the weekend. Yes, I did watch an episode of Supermarket Sweep.
3. ***The other reason being the contestants remained atrocious.
4. ****Truthfully, they’re Cosby sweaters, but I’m not sure I’m allowed to say Cosby anymore. Couldn’t risk it in outside of an asterisk.
5. *****Yes, that was me calling you boring.