Hello r/MandelaEffect
Like most people, I saw a cornucopia on the Fruit of the Loom packaging when I was a kid. I also saw Fruit of the Loom logos without a cornucopia. These logos used brown leaves around the bundle of fruit. I have developed a working theory as to what we saw and I'm interested in your opinions.
There were two places that I regularly saw Fruit of the Loom products when I was a kid: the discount store and Sears. I would buy Fruit of the Loom socks and underwear at the discount store and I would buy Fruit of the Loom shirts at Sears. However, I remember the Fruit of the Loom logo at Sears looking different than the Fruit of the Loom logo at the discount store. The Sears FOTL logo had brown leaves and no cornucopia while the discount store FOTL logo had the cornucopia. In particular, it had the cornucopia on the packaging, specifically for socks. Unlike shirts or underwear, socks tend to be a product without any inside tag. Rather, they just have packaging on the outside. Packaging which you almost immediately get rid of once you open the socks.
I have read almost every post about the Fruit of the Loom logo containing a cornucopia and by far the most interesting ones are these two: I found fruit of the loom products with the cornucopia on them! it might not be a mandela effect! : r/MandelaEffect (for the pictures) and I found a whole shelf of fruit of the loom socks with the cornucopia at my local super market : r/MandelaEffect (for the discussion). These are the posts where we find the classic picture of the black socks with the FOTL cornucopia packaging. But what's most interesting is the description and comment that occurs within the second post:
DESCRIPTION:
"Today i was on my local super market "exito" looking for socks for my new shoes and i saw a new fruit of the loom shelf, now this brand wasnt sold here in Colombia so i knew of them trough the Mandela effect, and would you Guess It when i went to see them there were a shelf full of socks with the cornucopia, strangely only the 3 pack socks have the cornucopia Cuz the other pack with more socks has the normal logo, im thinking that maybe the dude who translates the labels accidentally put a cornucopia logo on them or something because the Mandela effect is one of the first results for fruit of the loom on Google. Anyways no more talking heres the photos https://imgur.com/gallery/V06ot9w If anyone was wondering this is on éxito cacique, Bucaramanga, Santander, colombia
EDIT: turns out the logo is the same as a fan recreation from Google, so the explanation is the dude making the labels just used the wrong logo lol"
COMMENT:
Aromatic-Hornet 9449: "Heres a some better photos of the label . . . The first Pic says valid information for Colombia. Imported by c.i. iblu s.a.s nit (some numbers idk). Percentual composition 87% cotton/ 11% poliéster 1% Lycra/ 1% other materials (Then some washing instructions)
And for second pic It just says the size and like general stuff about the socks (like that It stretches) but It has a interesting part wich says that its made in usa so i dont think its a bootleg but the translator put the first picture he Saw on Google since a commenter said that he found the picture in a recreation
Fruit of the Loom made the socks, but it looks like packaging was made by the distributor, CI IBLU SAS.
Their website states "Nos aseguramos de la calidad de cada producto antes de almacenarlo y controlamos el inventario." ("We ensure the quality of each product before storing it and control inventory."), but nobody's perfect. https://ciiblu.com/paquete-completo-en-el-sector-textil-2/"
And it's that last comment which really stuck with: Fruit of the Loom made the socks but the packaging was made by the distributor. And only the 3 pack of socks were repackaged.
Before I thought that the Fruit of the Loom products with the cornucopia logo must have been counterfeits being sold by the discount store. But now I'm thinking that maybe they were real, but they were repackaged by the distributor. And the repackaging, specifically on the socks, included a logo with a cornucopia. Maybe they were just counterfeit Fruit of the Loom socks -- and the counterfeiters included a cornucopia on the logo -- but the idea of a distributor adding a cornucopia logo after the fact is the best theory that I have. Why they would do this? I have no idea. But specifically for socks sold at discount stores, I think that this is a very reasonable explanation. And when you consider that socks -- especially cheap socks -- are purchased in large quantities by parents, it makes perfect sense with the sock packaging would be the packaging that we associate most Fruit of the Loom. Even my parents remember a cornucopia logo, and I believe that of all Fruit of the Loom products which they were purchasing for me, they were purchasing socks the most.
I have no idea what to make of this Colombia example. Maybe it's bullshit. But I think that regardless of its accuracy, this example speaks to many of our experiences with Fruit of the Loom: discount stores, socks, and a cornucopia logo. And when we consider these three elements, I think that we can find a solution to this problem.
What do you think?