(Washingtonian) Local pizza chain &Pizza is facing heavy backlash and calls for a boycott after introducing new sugar-dusted marionberry pizza knots with a marketing campaign referencing former DC mayor Marion Barry’s drug arrest for possession of crack cocaine.
&Pizza announced the new icing-drizzled dessert yesterday with a press release reading: “&PIZZA CRACKS OPEN NEW THRESHOLD FOR DESSERT WITH KNOTS SO GOOD IT’S LIKELY A FELONY.” The limited-edition menu item was described as having enough powdered sugar to “force the DEA to look twice.” Promotional images further depicted powdered sugar like cocaine, wrapped in little baggies and piled on a mirror with a sign that said “our classic knots got a bump.”
“I just think it’s racist. In this city, it is outrageously racist. You can print that. It’s racist and disrespectful,” Cora Masters Barry, Barry’s wife, told DC News Now.
Several public officials are also speaking out. DC Council member Christina Henderson called it “tone deaf and hella disrespectful,” while Trayon White called for a boycott in light of the “shameless and tasteless exploitation of Marion S. Barry’s legacy.” Ronald Moten, cofounder of Don’t Mute DC, likewise called for a boycott: “You can’t spit on Marion Barry’s grave and think their[sic] won’t be consequences.”
In response to backlash, &Pizza CEO Mike Burns tried to play off the criticism yesterday. “We’re talking about a marionberry, that’s spelled with an ‘e’. We stuff that into a knot, drizzle it with icing and then top it with powdered sugar. It’s delicious – we can’t wait for D.C. to try it,” he said in a statement.
