State Fair Corn Dogs CEO Jorson Demamp announced Tuesday morning that his beloved and venerable company was making a remarkable pivot. State Fair will change its name to Crypto Dogs and diversify into blockchain technology.
“We’re going to put meat on a stick on a blockchain,” Demamp told Fortune in an interview just before the announcement. “Those bastards at Foster Farms won’t know what hit them.”
When pressed on specifics of the company’s plans, Demamp made the ‘jazz hands’ gesture and said “Razamatazz!” in a 1930s vaudeville voice.
Crypto Dogs is just the latest in a string of companies to add “blockchain” branding and see their market cap rise. Companies including Long Blockchain (formerly Long Island Iced Tea), Longfin (formerly in real estate), Riot Blockchain (formerly a biotech firm called Bioptix) and Crypto International Partners (formerly a pile of wet mattresses east of Shreveport) have seen massive stock surges after declaring they would explore blockchain tech. The news has already sent shares of State Fair’s parent company, Tyson Foods, into a heady rally. The close of 2017 had already been good to the stock, which was up nearly 30% since early September on cost-cutting and revenue growth.
But those gains were trounced on Tuesday after Twitter user Cryptoctopus began tweeting “$$NYSE TSN$$ PUMP PUMP PUMP” every thirty seconds to his 150,000 followers. CNBC also ran with the scoop, helping drive the stock up 500% within two hours.
Tyson Foods’ market value now exceeds the GDP of Hungary. By noon, anonymous sources reported seeing Tyson CEO Tom Hayes wandering the halls of the conglomerate’s Springdale, Arkansas headquarters, past artifacts of the group’s hardscrabble roots in a Depression-era family farm, muttering “I’ve wasted my life” under his breath repeatedly.
The Bitcoin community was largely supportive of the move. “This is the smart play,” said well-established cryptocurrency expert Jim Altshiller. “Blockchain is the future of breaded carnival foods, and if you buy my 12-part Cryptocurrency Megaprofits Extreeeeem course for just $4,500, you’ll understand exactly why.”
Others saw positive political implications. “Governments should not have a monopoly on deep-fried snacks, maintained only through the threat of violence,” said the prominent crypto-anarchist blogger known only as The Hammer of Rothbard. “If Crypto Dogs stays true to the spirit of individual liberty that laid the groundwork for cryptocurrency adoption,” he continued from a bunker in an undisclosed location, “I will fight beside them, no matter what dark arts the globalist reverse vampires who control our lives deploy to bring them down.”
The company also assured fans of battered food that they need not be concerned the rechristened Crypto Dogs will lose focus on its original business.
“Don’t worry, corn dog lovers,” the company wrote in a statement. “We are committed to maintaining the highest standards in our line of delicious food products, while also mastering the arcana of one of computer science’s most challenging subfields, coming up with an application and business model that none of the people who have been developing cryptocurrency for nearly 10 years have managed to conceive so far, and finding sterling talent to execute our vision at a time when blockchain engineers are mostly busy buying yachts.”
Fortune spoke to Crytpo Dogs CEO Demamp in an exclusive interview shortly after the announcement. “I mean, just think about it,” Demamp explained, panic creeping into his voice. “Cryptography. Corn dog batter. You use math to make both of them. We’ve been doing this for decades.”
But the company will face new challenges and increased shareholder scrutiny in the days and weeks ahead, and Demamp allowed that the company is still “trying to find someone who can explain the difference between Ethereum and Dogecoin for less than ten grand a day.” Many experts the company has contacted have already signed on to help old-world companies such as Kodak with their own blockchain pivots, constricting the already tight labor market. “Come on, I make corn dogs for a living and I’ve got two kids in college,” Demamp added.
“Please, anyone,” the executive could be heard whispering under his breath as he hung up, “Catch me before I fall.”
For more satire from Fortune, click here.
