Last time I caught a flight to Minnesota, I noticed something that has been in the back of my mind ever since... just a little tidbit that I thought was strange that's somehow stuck with me. When they gave me the in-flight pretzel snack, for some reason I studied the package of pretzels (I must have really been bored!), there at the bottom on the back was a phrase that has since stuck with me: "Snyder's of Hanover pretzels, not affiliated with Snyder's of Berlin".

What? Was there some kind of family feud in the pretzel business? I could imagine an old German immigrant getting angry at his cousin Lars at the sub-par quality of pretzels he churned out using the family name, then starting his own company to compete. The family would have split along the "crunchy but not overly-dry" or "salty but not overly-so" battle lines, and the two companies would battle it out in the free economy that is the promised land! Well, I found out that it's not nearly as exciting as that. Snyder's of Hanover is mainly a pretzel company with chips, Snyder's of Berlin is mainly a chip company with pretzels. The only connection seems to be pretzels. *sigh* I thought I was onto something big.