NEW YORK (AP) — The Uncle Ben’s rice brand is getting a new name: Ben’s Original. Parent firm Mars Inc. unveiled the change Wednesday for the 70-year-old brand, the latest company to drop a logo criticized as a racial stereotype. Mars had announced in the summer that the Uncle Ben’s brand would “evolve.”Since the 1940s, the rice boxes have featured a white-haired Black man, sometimes with a bow tie, an image critics say evokes servitude. In a short-lived 2007 marketing campaign, the company elevated Uncle Ben to chairman of a rice company. It also is planning a $2.5 million investment in nutritional and education programs for students in Greenville, Mississippi, the majority African-American city where the rice brand has been produced for more than 40 years.

Source: Huffington Post September 23, 2020 13:37 UTC