There have to be 500 jokes possible about this deal. About 350 of them really bad. About 75 wildly Anti-Semitic. But let’s just put it out there. Bain Capital is buying up all the Matzo. WTF, right?
Okay, not all the matzoh. But pretty much all the matzo. If you’re a member of the Hebrew tribe living in America you know that Manischewitz (nice Polish name) pretty much makes all the matzo. And most of the gefilte fish (rare treat) and even manages to make some seriously unfortunate wine. And now it’s all owned by the private equity spawn of Mitt Romney. (Unhelpful disclaimer: Mitt no longer runs Bain.)
Interestingly, Bain doesn’t think there’s a growing market in Jews. They’d sort of need their head examined for that. But they think they can leverage kashrut to enter the market for whole or at least pure and healthy foods. This has been one of the anchors of kosher butchers for centuries (kashrut as a quality control designation – very helpful before the FDA). I guess the idea is that you’re going to get trendy people to eat their dip or quac with Matzo. Hell, maybe it will even be a Superbowl Sunday thing. Got the beer, got the dip and salsa and got the matzo.
Let’s play ball!
For those of you among the gentiles, the thing about Manischewitz is that these babies are efficiently produced corporate matzos. Sort of the Ritz Cracker of the get the hell out of Egypt quickly world. Totally flat and symmetrical. The more hardcore Jews often go in for more oddly shaped and wiggly ones.
These are examples of sort of weird looking matzos that most Jews never eat unless they’re super orthodox or some kind of back to nature types.
But Manischewitz is like the drill sergeant of matzo, always the same, flat, by the books, no wiggly or fringy-edged nonsense. In other words, it’s the Mitt Matzo.
