Walking down Magazine Street in New Orleans while in town for the 2026 International Association for Food Protection (IAFP) Annual Meeting, I didn’t expect to encounter one of the week’s most revealing commentary on food safety.
Of course, cities often promote concerts, festivals, and sporting events. But nestled among the boutiques, bars and quaint shops were store signs that had nothing to do with tourism and everything to do with the national conversation around food safety.
One is as follows: “I’m just a girl trying to survive the heat, a big storm, and lettuce diarrhea.”
Another reassuring customer: “I haven’t pooped all week because of alcohol! Stay safe and stay sober!”
They are witty. They are cynical. They invite laughter.
Another fact worth noting also came to light.
The art of storytelling is alive and well in New Orleans. These signs illustrate one of the oldest principles of communication. People tell stories that they believe others will immediately understand.
The business owners who created these messages invested time, creativity, and store space because they expected passers-by to recognize the references. The humor succeeds because recent outbreaks and flashbacks have become part of our shared cultural vocabulary.
That observation deserves our attention.
This month began with a celebration of the 250th anniversary of the founding of the United States. Now this seems to be the end of a different national story. This is shaped by outbreaks, recalls, uncertainty, frustration, and growing questions about the safety of our food supply. Brands and restaurants have become linked in the public imagination through headlines that many consumers find difficult to distinguish. Few people distinguish between pathogens, supply chains, regulators, or individual companies. They simply see another food safety headline and wonder if the next meal they are serving their family is safe.
In that environment, these sidewalk signs behave much like today’s viral memes. Humor becomes a way to deal with uncertainty. Jokes become shorthand for shared experiences.
We’ve seen this before.
In the months since the landmark 1993 Jack in the Box. E. coli (It sickened hundreds of people across the Pacific Northwest, hospitalized more than 170, and claimed the lives of four young children, including my son Riley.) I encountered street vendors in California selling parody T-shirts featuring altered versions of the familiar Jack in the Box logo. The shirt reads “Crap in the Box,” an apparent reference to fecal contamination. E. coli.
There was no social media. There are no viral videos. No memes.
But the communication was strikingly similar.
People dealt with their fears through humor. They expressed their shared understanding through parody. They spread common cultural references through T-shirts, chats, bumper stickers, and word of mouth.
Technology has changed. Human nature is not like that.
For those of us who gather in New Orleans to discuss food protection, these signs are more than clever marketing. This is a reminder that food safety is no longer limited to scientific meetings, regulatory actions, or outbreak investigations. It has entered into everyday conversation. Jokes and novel signs on sidewalk blackboards have become so recognizable that they need no explanation.
It conveys an important message.
Public awareness has reached new levels as food safety has become part of popular culture. Consumers no longer only react to a single recall or outbreak. They are linking a chain of events into a broader perception of risk.
Trust follows the same path.
Trust in our food system is built over years and can be eroded one headline at a time. Restoring this trust will require more than ending outbreaks or ending recalls. We must consistently and visibly demonstrate that the systems responsible for protecting public health are worthy of the trust consumers place in them every day.
About the author: Darin Detwiler He is an internationally recognized food safety advocate, author, and professor. He is the author of: Food Safety: Past, Present, and ForecastFeatured expert on the 2023 Emmy Award-winning Netflix documentary Addicted: The Dirty Truth About FoodAnd he is the one who gave two TEDx talks in 2026. Why didn’t someone stop this? How leaders fall into the certainty gapExamines leadership and preventable risks. He also co-hosts a podcast. Confessions of a Food Safety Bastard.
