Is Paula Deens star apt to fall further as the bright lights of Vegas and Walmarts commerce engine put Ms. Deen on the blacklist? Fallout from her recent controversial statements keep popping up in todays entertainment news.
At last count Paula Deen has seen her future contract with the Food Network dry up, her industry support from Smithfield Foods go cold, and now Caesars Entertainment, Walmart, Home Depot and Novo Nordisk have severed ties with the longtime foodie favorite.
Spiraling out of control like soggy fried chicken, Paula Deen has appeared in tearful apologies to stop the fallout, but it seems that corporate sponsors have little tolerance for her controversial testimony taken in her brothers defense. We have seen it all before, the list of movie stars and sports celebrities is riddled with corporate sponsorships that have ended badly, but somehow it seems a little drastic when talking about the grandmotherly, southern lady.
Of course, that may be part of the stigma that Ms. Deen is up against. Her southern charm and loving manners have been questioned on a grand scale in todays entertainment news. Her troubles started as she admitted to using colorful, derogatory language and slurs during a court deposition in connection to her brother’s restaurant operations. At that point, it seems the corporations felt they had to distance themselves from near movie star ratings.
It is almost too hard to believe todays entertainment news when you see the list of sponsors and partners that Ms. Deen held court with, it was like a Who’s Who in Fortune 500 companies, but in a news and social media driven society it is hard to hide her past transgressions.
Financially, Deen is looking at losing a good portion of her cooking related empire. The NPD Group estimates that her products, restaurants, endorsements and other incentives total approximately 6.5 million each year. At last count, that number is falling closer to zero.
In a lot of ways, the single mother has become a movie star in terms of fame. She took a bad marriage and financially unstable life through a turnaround that reads like a book. Todays entertainment news is full of celebrity chefs and cooking personalities that just might owe a little bit of their success to the Paula Deen, not to mention corporate deals that will make you lick your lips.
Suddenly those deviled eggs are looking a little bit skinny as todays entertainment news keeps pace with Ms. Deen and her fall from grace…