MoonPie, the chocolatey snack of your childhood—and your parents’ childhood, and your grandparents’ childhood—is now 102 years old. The treat took off like a rocket in 1917 when Chattanooga Bakery created the marshmallow-filled cake. During the Depression, a 10-cent meal of a MoonPie and an RC Cola was known as the “working man’s lunch.” By World War II, the treat’s popularity soared as MoonPie-stuffed packages were shipped to soldiers overseas to remind them of home. In 1994, MoonPie even got its own annual party at Bell Buckle, Tennessee’s RC-MoonPie Festival in June.
Just because the fifth-generation family-owned brand has been around for more than a century doesn’t mean it’s stuck in the past or doesn’t enjoy a little social media break. Thanks to the creative minds of a team at the Knoxville-based Tombras ad agency, MoonPie has become a star on Twitter. @MoonPie shares thoughts, feelings, and general advice with its 284K followers—“you can marry a MoonPie as long it’s not your cousin” or “MoonPie recipe: slap a MoonPie on the grill and then build a deck with your old man or something.” On Twitter, MoonPie is lovable, a little bizarre, and brimming with half-baked advice: “Every time you eat a MoonPie a little bit of me stays with you forever” and “Eating a snack > looking like a snack > accidentally driving away someone you love Linda please come back.”
Like its recipe, MoonPie is an original. And as is often the case with Southern eccentrics, it’s not easy to land a sit-down chat with MoonPie. When you’re the graham cracker darling of the South, but also prone to existential breakdowns on social media (“Listen I know it’s kinda late or whatever but there’s still time to tear open a MoonPie and just tell it all about your day everything’s gonna be ok,” it once tweeted), allowing time for an interview happens only once in a blue moon.
Is there a MoonPie philosophy of life?
I already went over this in our MoonPie Policy but in case you didn’t read it “If there’s one thing we can learn from MoonPies, it’s that being good is the most important thing you can be whether you’re covered in chocolate or vanilla or even skin.”
How does MoonPie take a break from being MoonPie?
Why would I want to do that
Well, when you’re not being a tasty dessert, what do you do with your free time?
This goes back to a long line of questions from people who think a literal MoonPie is running this account to which I say “what”
You’re a relatively happy-go-lucky snack cake, but even you must have gloomy moments. Tell us about your dark side.
You don’t want to get on the dark side of the MoonPie
What’s the best cure for an existential crisis?
I have no idea try buying a MoonPie
What’s better, waxing or waning?
Anyone who says waning is probably anti-moon and you just can’t trust those kinds of people
MoonPie is getting ready to help America celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the Apollo 11 Lunar Landing on July 20 with the world’s largest MoonPie. What’s the buzz on that?
I can neither confirm nor deny these alleged celebrations
Fried chicken or barbecue?
Yes
You recently asked your followers to submit photos of their pet cats so you could guess the felines’ names. “Jorbyn” and “Senior Meteorologist Rod Langley reporting for Local News 9” were two of our favorites. But you’ve never shown the same interest in canines. Do you have something against dogs?
What kind of person hates dogs
We have to ask, based on past tweets, it seems like you didn’t appreciate Garden & Gun’s recipe for homemade Moon Pies. In fact, you Tweeted: “I’m sure it is good but it is not a MoonPie™.” But isn’t imitation the sincerest form of flattery?
No
We need a photo to accompany this Q&A. Can you send us your most flattering portrait?
I cannot but here is a portrait of me and a very good friend
Photo: Courtesy of MoonPie
Besties.
