Who Yassified CIBO Express?
disassociating in airports just got better
I’m traveling to LA today. Maybe I haven’t flown to California in 6 months (maybe that’s a decade in post-Ozempic-America-time), but the snack selection at CIBO Express in JFK is giving Expo West. CIBO’s parent company, OTG, was privately acquired in January.
What was once a sea of Nutter Butter satchels, crusty Bugles and sickly Brookside chocolate droppings, has magically been replaced by an allergy-free collection of snack caricatures formulated from the dust of bean, cassava, almond, mushroom and monk fruit byproducts. True Erewhon-style delicacies. We’re talking chickpea cheetos, cassava crisps, keto almond flour cookies, flavor-dredged nuts, and pea protein-yolked, monk fruit-marinated bars. We held a hurried funeral for Popcorners and pretzel crisps, and this is what rose from the ashes.
Disassociating in airport markets has always been one of my favorite pastimes. I believe time spent waiting in airports is free, the same way buying something with cash is free. You’ve already done the important work to make it to this point, so the rest is just for fun. No pressure to make good use of it! Waste away, if you like. On the rare occasion I make it through security before boarding begins, I cherish this time. I find myself blissfully amused by almost anything, like how some people feel after meditating and others after a Xanax and a glass of Sancerre. Wandering aimlessly, eyes glazed, with nothing but time to kill and magazines to buy in bouts of passion just to shove in the seat back pocket and watch Netflix instead.
The pleasure of extra time before your flight (but not too much) is akin to hearing a song on the radio that you like (don’t love), but the fact that you didn’t choose it makes it your favorite song. We can’t help but be charmed by the awesome serendipity of it. Airport time is like not having the aux—we can’t change it, so why not fuck around?
Back to today/disassociating. I arrived early to JFK (Terminal 5) and beelined for the main CIBO I usually hit—the one that feels cobbled together like a shaky 3rd grade shoebox diorama or an international textile bazaar. This particular CIBO is bordering Artichoke Pizza, some bagel place and Dunkin, which are never the point. Prepared to assume my usual dreamlike saunter through the market before leaving with a water and nothing else, I was suddenly struck by what I saw. Desirable, exciting snacks? Fun little beverages? Could it be… a shoppy shop? (
). Interest piqued…
You name it, CIBO had it. Siete chips and cookies, Highkey cookies, Catalina Crunch cereal and snack mixes, Mid-Day Squares, BTR Nation bars and chocolate cups, Barnana plantain chips and nuggets, Biena chickpea thins, Misfits bars, Karma Nuts, Yolele chips (?), Chomps and Vermont meat sticks, Stryve beef jerky, Moko mushroom jerky, Mindright nootropic-infused protein bars and chips, Daily Crunch dill pickle nuts (needed salt), Smart Sweets, Yum Earth gummies, Unreal candies, Partake GF cookies, Freestyle olives, Poppi, and more. There wasn’t a single sugarcane in sight. I knew it was over when I saw my favorite “wrapped cashews” (albeit not in my favorite flavor, which I’ll take to the grave) which I can’t even find at Whole Foods or Erewhon, and my Amazon seller keeps sending me the wrong flavor. Truly go off, CIBO. Hudson or CNBC News could never.
Suddenly, the old ways felt sad and inadequate. Whimsically pattering around pedestals of SAHALE snacks and NYPD merch was a simple pleasure of times past. Now, we could do research. This was culture, this was Erewhon. Business depends on our personal consumer reporting.
This excitement also made me nostalgic for planes before seatback TVs and WiFi. Don’t you want to go back just once and get a silver American Airlines pin, futz with the seatback landline, and have nightmares at age 7 after watching The Sixth Sense on the big (only) screen? I do.
Anyway, does anyone else think its weird that CIBO sounds like SIBO? Is this a coincidence? Now more than ever does this make me think we live in a simulation. All those fake power puffs and blood-sugar stable Oreos are certainly not making fast-friends with our gut microbiome. Idk. Did your ancestors eat chicken chips?
This is just magnificent! Thank you so much for this, made me laugh AND go hmmmm...
Everyone is entitled to chicken chips! And elevated snacks…so glad you liked them! 😉