TBA

Few things set the TBA gears a-grinding more than when companies put something on the market with intentionally misspelled words in the name. Variants on this poor usage abound, but it usually seems to involve using ‘z’ when proper spelling calls for ‘s’. There are endless numbers of Cheez-based products, for example. But there are also many things that are Kleen, or Brite, or, Kleen Brite, or, For the Love of Pete, Brite Kleen. Xtra-this, Xtreme-that. Come to think of it, the bestowing of superlative "Extreme" status on this or that product probably warrants its own TBA entry. To say nothing of Gatorade Xtremo.
There are also many products that seem to be misspelled, but are in fact merely made-up words. For example, the pain reliever Aleve. Aleve is not a word; alleviate is. Many automobile names fall into this category--but we will not address this phenomenon here. Puns are also beyond our scope: Everyone knows about School Daze. Pharmacies and office supply stores roll out this advertising war horse every Fall. But we do take exception when they enter Skool Daze territory.
Readers may remember All Things Chipotle*, where we linked to the Chipotle Grilled Stuft Burrito from Taco Bell. This unleavened monstrosity continues to stir up a fuss. Why is the word 'stuffed' misspelled? Is the burrito stuffed, or what? Is a "Stuft" condition empirically different than one of being 'Stuffed?' Is this Taco Bell's opening salvo in what will be a wider linguistic war of phonetic liberation? Can people not pronounce 'stuffed?' Is Taco Bell worried that people will place the accent on the second syllable (stufféd), as if it were not fast food, but the muse of some mopey Elizabethan? And why "Stuft"? What if instead the thing was Grild, or even Grilt? What if it was a Buritto?**
Maybe if people started inserting the editorial identifier [sic] whenever writing the names of these things, it would so confuse and enrage the companies that they would start spelling things correctly.
And, finally, Witness the fast food chain Chick-fil-A [sic]. Now, we don't have these establishments up in our neck of the woods, but we have seen their billboards during our travels throughout the land. Their primary advertising*** involves comical drawings of mischievous cows scrawling graffiti on barn doors that says "Eat Mor Chikin" [sic]. Now, we actually like the ads and think they are funny. After all, cows cannot be expected to spell correctly. Note that they do not misspell 'Eat!' Let that word resonate exactly correctly in would-be diners' brains. But the name. Why all the hyphens? 'Fil' instead of 'Fill?' Why is the F not capitalized? And if it was a Canadian enterprise, would they have named it Chick-fil-Eh?
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*TBA, 16 December 2005

**This gives us an idea. How about if Taco Bell created something called the Burritito. We are thinking along the lines of a Cluster Bomb design. It would be a big burrito, but when the diner bites into it, it would fracture into multiple tiny burrititos (burrito bomblets) that parachute out of the larger burrito hull for an Xtreme[sic] Taste Sensation. It could be served in a camouflage wrapper.

***Award-winning, according to their website.