Hello friends and foes,
Welcome to the 29th weekly edition of FROOMESWORLD: THE NEWSLETTER. We’re nearly 30! Can relate!!
Loyal employees like yourself may have noticed a gear shift in the company’s mechanics of late. A lane switch, if you will.
I made an executive decision earlier this month to sink some more resources into mission TikTok. The objective of this mission is not to gain new employees. Instead, it is an attempt at manipulating the app’s algorithm so it works for us, offering up cold cut content to be plundered and repurposed on the Instastory.
I truly have been spending upwards of three hours a day down there in the trenches, swiping past absolutely fucked shit in an effort to discover the next best Funniest Video to share with my colleagues.
Sometimes these expeditions yield gold:
But other times, they provoke thought:
I saw this and went, yeah fuck!! I remember this so clearly. It was a different time – one where Supre, Gasp and Bardot reigned supreme, Tuesdays were goals (Rove Live) and Paris Hilton was not yet considered an icon and/or genius.
With the current news cycle serving up a buffet of wet slop, there’s never been a better time to kick flip your razor scooter down the halls of this nation’s past. The good, the bad, and the Kyle Sandilands.
1. the coogee bay poo mystery
This combines so many FW interests that it would be a crime not to include.
The year was 2008. One October afternoon, a family descended upon The Coogee Bay Hotel to watch the NRL Grand Final (which is the most Australian sentence ever, even more so when you learn their last name is Whyte).
The place has recently undergone a refurb, complete with new restaurant and new menu.
Mother Jessica ordered a $19 bowl of chocolate gelato. Out it came, and so displeased was she with the size of the thing, she made a complaint and sent it back.
When the hotel’s manager came back and hand-delivered a complimentary bowl to the table, it appeared that her Speak To The Manager moment had paid dividends. Until it didn’t.
She took a bite.
“There were four scoops including vanilla, chocolate and hazelnut. At the bottom, there appeared to be chocolate,” Whyte told the Sydney Morning Herald at the time.
“Greedily, I went for it ahead of the kids. Thank heavens I did. The stench, the taste … I spat the food into a napkin and immediately I was sick.”
When the press caught wind of the incident, they went wild. The headlines from the time are Pulitzer Prize-level.
Incredible. The Whytes went on to lap it (the situation, to clarify) up, with the Dad dolling out interviews with classic lines such as “The real issue is that we were fed, as a family, shit, at someone’s pub.”
After weeks of this shite, the family accepted a settlement, allegedly worth $50,000. The culprit, however, remains at large.
2. gasp jeans being cunty
Like many of my employees, a pre-teen Froom was personally victimised by Gasp Jeans. Whether it was the retail assistants commenting on your muffin top or forcing you into purchasing a $450 scrap of fabric that doubled as a dress… it was an absolute armpit of a place.
Imagine, then, the sweet taste of schadenfreude we collectively enjoyed when they got savaged worldwide in 2011.
That year, an email exchange between a disgruntled customer and a staff member named Chris* went viral. The customer complained that he had yelled 'Fat bitch' at the pair when they decided not to buy dresses he had pushed upon them.
It kicked up a media shitstorm, and instead of apologising, a Gasp spokesperson doubled down, concluding that their “product offerings are very, very carefully selected, so to ensure that we do not appeal to a broad customer base. Some people come into the store who don't want to turn heads, who don't want to stand out from the crowd and that's not what we sell.”
I had this dress, and can confirm, did turn heads.
Also, 2020 plot twist, the former boss of the company Qiu Shan-Lian is apparently wanted by Chinese authorities over drugs claims and believed to be hiding in plain sight. Hectic!
*To confirm, it is not Chris in that photo. It’s unfortunate that he looks like a Chris.
3. australia puts frank sinatra on blast
Here’s one sent in by employee Billy. So in 1974, Frank Sinatra landed his private jet in Sydney ahead of a “comeback tour”.
swag
As per all tours, he was expected to speak to the press to promote his show… but refused.
As a result, Australian journalists went hog wild – chasing him, following his motorcade, heckling him at the shows. Super pest areas, but they were just doing their job.
One night he was doing a performance at Melbourne’s Town Hall (love that place, saw Bliss N Eso perform in 2008 and it was a transcendental experience) and he used it as an opportunity to put the media on blast.
He went on a verbal tirade, the worst of which saw him refer to female journalists as “hookers”.
At the time the feminist movement was absolutely popping, so the comment went down like a lead balloon. As a result, union members who controlled the lighting, staging and musicians of his shows went on strike. They refused to start work again unless he apologised.
Sinatra retorted.
"Unless within 15 minutes Mr Sinatra had an apology for '15 years of shit' from the Australian press, he would be leaving the country within the hour," wrote Sinatra's lawyer.
Then the Transport Union got involved, refusing to refuel his plane unless he apologised. So with no musicians, no stage, no drivers or room service, he was grounded and in for a shit one.
Union V Sinatra couldn’t manage a truce, so PM at the time Gough Whitlam was forced to send someone in to negotiate. Enter the president of the Australian Council of Trade Unions… Bob Hawke.
Apparently Hawke went in, sunk a bottle of brandy and brokered a truce of sorts. Together they wrote a “statement of regret” from both parties. It wasn’t an apology, but it was something, and as a gesture of goodwill Sinatra allowed his Sydney performance to be televised for his Melbourne fans to enjoy.
To me, this is truly the most perfect example of why unions (particularly media ones) play such an integral role in holding powerful dickheads to account. As a proud member of the MEAA, this CEO stans!
4. murder in the price household
Bit of FROOMESWORLD trivia.
Back in the 60s, a serial killer by the name of Eric Edgar Cooke started terrorising Perth. He was dubbed ‘The Night Caller’ because (among other methods) he’d knock on people’s doors then shoot them when they answered.
Steve Price (FW’s Chief Financial Officer) was a young boy at this point, living with his family in Nedlands – the epicentre of these crimes.
Here, he tells the story:
In the early 60s, my family and I went to a place called Geraldton. We went on a fishing trip and in the cabin next to us, the father’s wife was washed off the rocks and died. So Nanna said, “I don’t wanna hang round here with the police and ambulance, I wanna go home.” So we headed off home, then when we got home. Poppy walked into the house and said “What are all these peanut shells doing on the ground?” And Nanna said, “It’s got nothing to do with me, I cleaned the house before we left!” Mum was fastidious.
Then they realised someone had been in the house while we were away. So Poppy rang the police. The police came over and say “Listen, three murders committed in the last week within 100 yards of your house.” They said, “We think Eric Cooke has been holed up in your house.”
Cos he murdered one fellow, then he went along the Western Highway, saw this guy in a clothing shop putting on women’s clothing, and he didn’t shoot him because he thought he was an oddball like him. Then he went further down and killed another shop owner. I think he shot three people in one night. Shot them dead, didn’t wound them, shot em dead.
So anyway, the police asked Poppy, “Have you got a gun? Or do you have a gun license?” because the most recent murders were committed using a gun, so they thought Cooke may have stolen one from the house.
The way it ended, the police go “Look, it’s pretty obvious he’s been here. Be on your wits because he might come back and think the house is vacant and use it as a hideout.”
He didn’t come back. But isn’t it terrifying to think, had they been home, a terrible tragedy could have befallen this family? And therefore, this newsletter wouldn’t have found it’s way to your spam folder?!
5. bonds kaleidoscope ad
The fifth and final sip of Australian Tea has got to be the famous Bonds Kaleidoscope ad of 2007.
Iconic! Mesmerising! The exclusively size 6 dancers? Demon-inducing!
I think about this ad, and this song, often. Mainly because it’s an audiovisual ear-worm, but also because I still have a pair of these undies from 14 years ago. That I still wear. For context, I’ve had them for longer than I haven’t had them.
What made this ad so iconic, though, was the spoof that it inspired. Thank you, McKinnon Secondary College, for this.
I can smell the Lynx from here… and it smells fkn ok actually.
In the words of Rove, goodnight, and say hi to your mum for me.
PS: I just realised it looks like our little mascot has a massive boner! Please pray he finds his princess, and some sweet relief, ASAP.
Froomy.