Ryan: All right. Well, welcome to Offline Days, the Time Machine podcast that takes us back to the the eighties and nineties before technology just steamrolled the planet. I'm your host Ryan and this is my partner in crime.
Coley: I'm Coley and check it out. I got a I got a hat off on days. Yeah.
Ryan: Yeah, we got some merch there. So all right. and today we are so excited to have Sarah Gonzalez, who is a host and reporter for Planet Money. NPR's acclaimed podcast, kind of known for making the the complex forces shaping the economy more engaging, accessible, and entertaining. we wanted to bring her on to discuss, you know, first off her experiences growing up pre-internet internet, then kind of segment into a a recent podcast episode that investigates the sneaky ways companies try to get chemicals into our foods here in the US. So thanks for for joining us, Sarah. How are ya?
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah, I'm good. Thanks for having me.
Ryan: Yeah, yeah. So go ahead, Callie.
Coley: What w what the heck are you doing on our show? You're so it's
Sarah Gonzalez: Listen, I'm a nineties kid. I was like, they're nineties guys. I'm just gonna I'm just gonna stop by. no, I was I was happy that you guys asked. We we love talking to other shows.
Ryan: That's awesome. So what do you so I guess first off, where where were you? Were you born? East coast, west coast, or what w where were you born?
Sarah Gonzalez: West Coast, San Diego, California girl. Grew up on the border. I feel like I'm a border girl, really, both both
Ryan: Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: Tijuana and San Diego. but I mean I mainly San Diego, obviously. well, I'm not obviously, but
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: Ha ha ha.
Sarah Gonzalez: mainly San Diego. and yeah, I mean born in the born in the eighties, but like nineties kid, because I was like a baby in the late eighties. So nineties are my were my coming of age years, you know.
Ryan: Right. So what do you kind of looking back, reflecting, what do you remember most from the nineties?
Sarah Gonzalez: like calling people on a landline, like, hi, can Samantha is Samantha there? Can she come to the phone calling my mom at work and being like, Hi, is Aita there? I it's her daughter. I need to ask her card being like super nervous to call your mom at work, which is insane that we even did that. Like, and you'd
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: just be like put on hold and listen to like elevator music and then you'd be like, Do you want me to put this in the fridge? And my mom would be like, Why are you calling me
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: for this thing? So, like phone calls, I think were a big, a big one. Like boys calling you, you calling boys, like all that kind of stuff was just like, it wasn't so secretive. Like the whole household would be like, Luis is calling
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: Sarah, you know? And like that was like fun.
Coley: Did did you ever
Ryan: Was there like a gatekeeper involved? Like where because I feel like whenever whenever I would call, I would call like, you know, house, you know, the dad might have picked up the phone. He's like, Who is this calling?
Sarah Gonzalez: Not my house. My I had a cool house. My parents were cool.
Ryan: Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: but other people like me calling other people was like nerve-wracking because I people I feel like other parents were just like more strict or formal, and my my mom's like super informal and chill, and my dad just deferred to my mom. but yeah, so phone calls was a very, very big one. Even like ordering food and I remember being like to my sister, like, No, you do it, you order the pizza, no you'd be like No, no, you and then with the ring you'd like, and you're like ham the phone, like, No,
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: like you do 'cause you're just like chicken out. I don't know why phone calls were such a big deal as a kid, but they were for me. And then like Yeah, good.
Coley: Yeah, was I was gonna ask you if if you ever like prepped, like I remember prepping for like making that phone call to that girl or making that phone call and be like, all right, I gotta say it, it's gotta be quick, it's gotta be, you know, you you might have the gatekeeper. You you absolutely would have the gatekeeper on some of the some of the things and be like, it's gotta be quick, and then I we gotta get on, and then but but people would still like pick up the phone and like listen to your conversations.
Sarah Gonzalez: Well we'll pe then like someone else in the house would pick up and you'd be like, I'm on the phone, I'm talking to so and so. And then that was like embarrassing. Yeah, I would prep.
Ryan: Ha ha ha.
Sarah Gonzalez: I remember mainly prepping
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: for like for like placing like a pickup order. Like a pe like like it'd like two large pepperoni pizza, like just two large pepperoni pizza, and then you go and then you're just like buckle under pressure and you'd like hand the phone off to somebody else. what else do I miss and mainly remind and then like like innocent childhood pranks.
Ryan: Mm.
Sarah Gonzalez: I feel like no one does those kinds of things. Well, I don't know. I don't think people like TP each other's houses anymore. No, right?
Coley: My what No. My daughter tries
Ryan: yeah.
Coley: to prank call me now, but it comes up as her f her name on my phone. And sh she's eight and so sh she
Sarah Gonzalez: Old is she? Yeah. You're like, let me show you caller D. yeah, Caller AD killed so much. It the suspense
Coley: She she she calls me yeah so much.
Sarah Gonzalez: of like, is it gonna be them? Is like it just it ruined the suspense and killed killed some joy, I think. There, yeah.
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: I'm gonna try to bring I have two little girls, and I they're
Ryan: Outer ears.
Sarah Gonzalez: like little, like they're two and four. Well, one's almost five, so two and almost five. And I'm like plotting how I'm gonna teach them to do like the fun 90s, like, you know, when you like get when you're like older, like preteen teenager, and you're like at a red light and you like get out of the car and run around the car. You know, like those kinds of things.
Coley: Ha ha.
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: which actually might be and like maybe that's actually dangerous. So they'd be like walking on the
Coley: Ha ha ha.
Sarah Gonzalez: but like on a small side street, maybe at a stop sign. Yeah.
Coley: Wait, were those called Chinese fire drills? Is that does that ring a bell? Is that I it's a I'm sure it's probably not politically correct, but
Sarah Gonzalez: Is that what they're called? Problematic name. Probably not. I don't remember them having a
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: name, but I remember doing it as like a 12 or 13-year-old and thinking it was like the coolest.
Ryan: Did you ever t toilet paper someone's house?
Sarah Gonzalez: I didn't because I was like a good kid, but I think we would do it like we would do like small to our friends. Like I'd like TP her bush. And then like they'd
Ryan: yeah, yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: do it back and but like we all knew, like we'd be like, they're gonna come over and like do this, like whatever. but I feel like that was just so innocent. Or like ding dong ditching, that one you have to do with your kids, I feel like.
Ryan: yeah, yeah. You had to be quick. You had to be quick though, you know, just like just light on the feet, maybe a few trees around,
Sarah Gonzalez: Mm-hmm.
Ryan: go hide around back. Yeah, I definitely remember that.
Coley: That is Violet's new favorite game right now, is she likes to ding dong ditch. So at least we have that going for us.
Sarah Gonzalez: Interesting. Yeah.
Ryan: I called it ring and run.
Coley: Ring and run.
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: where are you guys from? Mm Denver.
Coley: Right here, Denver.
Ryan: C Denver C yeah. And I'm I'm from North
Sarah Gonzalez: You guys just had different names for it.
Ryan: North Carolina.
Sarah Gonzalez: what part?
Ryan: Yeah, so I'm from I'm from Greensboro but lived in Raleigh for many years.
Sarah Gonzalez: My husband's from Greensboro. I love Greensboro.
Ryan: Shut the front door, are you serious?
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah. The the Greensboro Airport and this where my husband's from and the San Diego airport are like the two best airports in the they're like the easiest airports ever. It's like there's never anyone there. It's like small and
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: totally manageable and like clean and anyways, yeah. I love Greensboro. It's so green.
Ryan: In and out. Where did he go to where did he go to high school?
Sarah Gonzalez: I know that there's Paige I know that there's Paige, but Paige was the fancy school. Was Paige the
Ryan: Sorry to put you put you on the Yeah, Paige Grimsley. Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: fancy school or Grimsley was the fan fancy school?
Ryan: Maybe I don't think Grims Grimsley, Page, I went to Northwest, which was like the the kind of back backwoods school.
Sarah Gonzalez: No, he didn't go to that one. He like talks about his friends and they were like, he went to like Page and that was the fancy school, but I don't remember which one was the fancy one. It was you just went to one
Ryan: Yeah, I th
Sarah Gonzalez: of the public schools there.
Ryan: Got it. Yeah, that's and when did he when did he graduate? I'm trying to like make myself seem super old so I can just get a
Sarah Gonzalez: He is like three years older than me. So graduate
Ryan: Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: high school. I graduated high school in 2005, so he probably did like 2002-ish. maybe you guys know each other. I'm gonna ask him.
Ryan: Okay. That's not I could have I'm two thousand, so I mean it's I mean it could've I mean it could have been in the same same circles or, you know, you know someone that knows someone type deal, but
Sarah Gonzalez: do you know who Ty Tysinger is?
Ryan: That does not ring a bell, but I feel like I if I knew that that's a
Sarah Gonzalez: Okay. I th that's like my my husband's best friend, but his parents are like, you know, they'd always like write op eds at the newspaper. And so I was like, maybe they
Ryan: Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: maybe that rings a bell for you. But my husband's name is Steven Lasseter, if that rings a bell.
Ryan: No. Steven. Okay. W Lassiter. Okay. Stephen L I'm gonna I'm gonna make note of that and do some research on my end.
Sarah Gonzalez: And his he has a older brother who's actually probably closer to you,
Ryan: it's such a random place like Greensboro, you know.
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: So that's
Sarah Gonzalez: It is it is it's not common that I meet someone from Greensboro. Yeah.
Ryan: Yeah. No, that's that's cool though. So what so what kind of what kind of kid were you growing up? Like were you adventurous? Were you more kind of just reserved? Were you
Sarah Gonzalez: Like like elementary school age or like high school age?
Ryan: Yeah, yeah. Like 'cause I'm gonna start the elementary and then I'm gonna kinda segment into the to the formidable high school years.
Sarah Gonzalez: elementary school, I was not shy, not reserved. I was like writing speeches, doing speech competitions. I like knew I wanted to be a reporter when I was in third grade.
Ryan: cool.
Sarah Gonzalez: because I liked writing and I liked performing. And I was like, well, this is the two things combined. And my mom was like, You're a genius. I
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: Ha ha.
Sarah Gonzalez: was like eight, and I was like, I figured it out, and she was like, Wow, prodigy.
Coley: Ha ha
Ryan: That's funny.
Sarah Gonzalez: I was just like a like a I don't know. bubbly little like talkative outgoing girl. I guess I'm one of four girls. and I had two
Ryan: Nice. Okay. So no brothers?
Sarah Gonzalez: little sisters that were like my baby dolls, you
Ryan: No.
Sarah Gonzalez: know, so I was like playing with them when I was in elementary school and yeah. No brothers, all girls.
Ryan: That's got it. Yeah, I have just one brother and I felt like definitely it could have benefit, you know, on the female knowledge side having like a sister.
Sarah Gonzalez: Every time I meet guys, I'm always like, You had a sister? And they're like, I have three, right? And I'm Yeah, you act like you had or
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: they'll be like, I moisturized. And I'm like, You moisturize? Like, okay, you had someone help you and guide you.
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: and then actually just like speaking of tech, elementary school was like the Tamagotchi era. So we did
Ryan: Mm.
Sarah Gonzalez: have, remember the little like the little like pagery looking whatever animals that you took care of?
Ryan: Yep. I do.
Coley: The ones you tried to keep alive.
Sarah Gonzalez: I don't think I I don't think I had one, but I played with other people's. But
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: that was like the beginning of like tech addiction for our generation.
Ryan: Oof, oof.
Coley: I had the knockoff ones were which were called Giga Pets. Yeah. Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: gig up, I remember those. I didn't know they were gig I didn't know they were knockoffs.
Coley: I think the Tamagotchi ones were the exciting ones that everybody wanted. And then Giga.
Ryan: I did have a pager, which is embarrassing to say, but
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: That's not I my sister had a pager. My older sister I never did, but I wish I could say that I had one. I always wanted one. Like the clear ones where you could see the wires in them. I was always like, those
Ryan: yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: are so cool.
Coley: Ha ha ha.
Ryan: And I can't imagine there was anything ever important like it's like yeah, I really need to get to this because I need to go meet my friend at the arcade and we're gonna go play some video games.
Sarah Gonzalez: But like I remember I don't know. I guess my sister would like page me on other people's pages because I remember like going to the payphone payphone in middle school, like the payphone on campus at like my middle school to like call my to like page my sister and then she would call like we would I don't know how we would call from like sh you could like call a payphone, I guess.
Ryan: yeah. Yeah. Huh.
Sarah Gonzalez: And you and like 'cause then it'd be like, hey, Sash, like in the middle of like the schoolyard and yeah. So and I don't know, I feel like those are it like taught a lot of independence. Like I can't
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: like you would like ask people for the phone and like I don't even know who'd like taught you how to use a payphone. You just like started using payphones and paging people. I don't know.
Ryan: I agree. I agree. It was
Sarah Gonzalez: But we were so little on payphones.
Ryan: Well we had to I mean, I feel
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: like we kinda had to grow up a little bit earlier in that in that era, which, you know, I think we were afforded yeah, in that sense. But also right. But I feel like we also
Sarah Gonzalez: In that sense, not in other sense, like not in like makeup and stuff, which is more like today's world.
Ryan: had more of a leash from a hey, go out and play with your friends, go kinda like explore a little bit more versus today. 'cause I can definitely remember like just riding bikes in the neighborhood and doing all that kind of stuff until the sun went down and then it was better be home situation. so what was your kind of favorite way to waste a entire Saturday? You know, think about in high school before the internet existed.
Sarah Gonzalez: I mean, I was like a cheerleader in high school. So I had a lot of cheer practices on Saturday
Ryan: Okay. Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: or like cheer obligations of like we're performing at this like community event or you know, things like that. so I think sports took up a decent amount of my after school and weekends. and like the mall. We just like went
Ryan: Course.
Sarah Gonzalez: to the mall a lot. Yeah, and the movies. Those were like that was where you went. We didn't even that's like pre-Starbucks, you know what I mean? Like we didn't even like go
Ryan: Course, yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: get coffee. Like we just didn't have anything to do or anywhere to go except them all.
Ryan: No. I mean, it was we have an episode on that too, because it the mall was a coming of age place, right? Do you do you remember a couple of your where would you hang out of the mall or favorite stores or or things like that that may not exist anymore?
Sarah Gonzalez: We pe so I don't know about you do you guys remember like Star Shots?
Ryan: I think was
Coley: No.
Ryan: that a is that pizza?
Sarah Gonzalez: Maybe you guys had a different age. So at in my circles in Southern California
Ryan: Mm-hmm.
Sarah Gonzalez: or in San Diego. Well, yeah, Southern California, because like our LA family would do the same thing. You would go to take pictures with your friends and the backdrop, you remember? And the backdrop's always like hearts or like smile now, cry
Coley: Yeah, I remember it. Yeah.
Ryan: Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: later, or like whatever. And then you would just like go and not smile, and you'd be like, And then everyone was just like just a bunch of like eleven and twelve and thirteen year olds just like paying to not smile in pictures. And then they would like pose you
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: like this for like back to back. And and then we'd have it was like the original Instagram. We would like
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: put our and your binder used to have like all the little like slots for just star shot pictures, and you'd get like four rows of your friends and your binder was just front and back, like star shots of your friends, and now it's like Instagram is where you show your pictures, but We used to walk around with them on our binders.
Coley: Ha ha.
Ryan: What about like clothing stores that you y maybe used to shop at that potentially don't exist today? I can think of a few off the top of my head, but Or maybe that
Sarah Gonzalez: What? G name some.
Ryan: not exist today, but they're So no, I guess they do still exist. Like Abercrombie and Gap and things like that, like they're they're kinda
Sarah Gonzalez: All them they all exist, but there was they were like the thing, you know? I they were like
Ryan: Yeah, they were massive back then, yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: yeah, like they didn't they used to have like models in their windows and with like no shirts
Ryan: yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: on or something like that. Like the guys, didn't they used to like I don't remember, but I just yeah, I think they're all still around, but they're not sorry, my alarm is going off.
Ryan: you're good.
Sarah Gonzalez: they're all still around, but they just don't they're not like the trend like they were back then.
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: Agreed. What about music
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah.
Ryan: music wise? What kinda what kind of what kind of jams were you bumping, you know, back in the day?
Sarah Gonzalez: I'm I have potentially embarrassing tastes in music, I would say. I have like like
Ryan: let's hear it.
Coley: No you no you don't.
Sarah Gonzalez: old man music tastes.
Ryan: Ooh, okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: but I like it all. Like I someone told me that it's like called yacht rock recently, which I didn't know, but I'm like a yacht rock girl for sure. It's like the music
Ryan: yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: that I listen to my parents and my aunts and
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: uncles listen
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: to, right? That it ha I have like fond memories of that kind of music. And then of course like
Coley: The like sixties and seventies music.
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah.
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah. Sixties and seventies music and then like Mexican music and it's like what we like call like Sunday morning cleaning music where it's like Sunday morning you put on certain Mexican songs and everyone cleans the house on Sunday. and then like obviously like nineties hip hop and our like that's you know, like of course,
Ryan: Ooh. Yeah. Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: a bunch of songs we probably should not have been listening to as preteens. We're like
Ryan: Remember the old the parental advisory kind of little sticker you try to buy like a C D or something?
Sarah Gonzalez: Do they not have those anymore? They must still have those.
Ryan: I don't I haven't bought an well, I mean they don't do they sell do they still sell C Ds?
Sarah Gonzalez: CD
Coley: They they have a little
Sarah Gonzalez: CDs are back now, Ryan. All this stuff is coming. The isn't the flip phone coming back or is like is they're
Ryan: shoot I feel like
Coley: They are.
Sarah Gonzalez: trying to make that back? Yeah.
Coley: The songs have a little E next to That's the only reason I know that.
Sarah Gonzalez: explicit.
Coley: The only reason I know that is because my daughter goes, Dad, do you wanna know how I know how this song has cussing in it? And I said, How? And she goes, There's a little E next to it. And I said, Yeah, that makes sense. That makes sense. Cause I can t I told her that she can cuss in when she sings. That's that's our rule. That she can she can do it when she's frustrated, she can do it when she's singing, and she but she can't do it at a person. And so
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah, that sounds like great parenting advice. Just don't cuss at people. Sounds good. Yeah.
Coley: Right. Yeah.
Ryan: Yeah. And that's yeah, so music and I mean it was just I feel like it's just a different world that we live in now, you know? Like like I feel like we've we've traveled like five hundred years in twenty years is what it feels like to me.
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah, but then also like going then it's sometimes I feel like we're going backwards in time. Like I'm like, we used to write letters and then we invented telephones to call people and now we're just like texting again. And I'm like, we should just call more. Like we're going backwards sometimes. There you go.
Coley: Now we're we're we're back to hieroglyphics with emojis.
Ryan: That's true. That is true.
Coley: We we've gone way back. We're like
Sarah Gonzalez: Figure it out. What do you think I'm trying to say with those emojis?
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: Right. do you still remember any 'cause we had to remember a bunch of phone numbers for our like, you know, friends. Do you still do you have any that that are still on
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah.
Ryan: the top of your memory?
Sarah Gonzalez: God, I haven't thought about that. Like the o I only know one person's phone number and it's my older sister's.
Ryan: Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: And cause like she got a cell phone first. And so then I remember memorizing her number and using it for a long time. And whenever it'd be like, what's your emergency? Or like if you have emergency contact, I would always like always put her. and so now to today I only know hers, my mom's and my husband's. I don't know anyone else's phone numbers.
Ryan: Yeah. I feel like I still remember like four or five it's that are just etched etched
Sarah Gonzalez: That's nice. So, okay,
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: so I did an episode for Planet Money for my the podcast that I work out once. so just like to give you a little sense of my nineties nostalgia, which is real actually.
Ryan: Yeah, yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: which was about how nineties to me were like the golden age of commercials. Like I was like,
Ryan: yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: like maybe she's born with
Coley: Hundred percent.
Sarah Gonzalez: it. Maybe it's Maybelline. Like Mentos the Fresh Maker. Like the best part of Waking up. Like folders in your cup. Like all those. Like I was like, where did the jingle go? Like we used to have like we we knew all these jingles, but the reason I bring this up is because I was like talking to my little sister about it and she was like, I still remember the phone numbers from like the commercials. Like like like the carpet cleaning commercial and like the Bale Bondsman commercials. Like she's like, I can like we can like sing you those phone numbers and I'm
Coley: Mm-hmm.
Sarah Gonzalez: like, that's and it's because like the jingles just had like staying power. So no, I don't remember the people in my lives phone numbers, but I do remember commercials because I don't know, like when was the last time you guys heard a jingle in a commercial? I feel like it's been
Ryan: I love jingles.
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah.
Ryan: I wanna write jingles right now and and and we
Coley: Right.
Ryan: should do like a we should do like a something with the podcast, Coley, where on social media we just do clips of of nineties commercials and like have people like guess like what they are, you know?
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: 'cause like you're saying, the best part of waking up is folders in your and then there was like the got milk, there was like the Budweiser, what's up, what's up?
Coley: God.
Ryan: And the frogs, but eyes, bud er. Mentos, the freshmaker?
Sarah Gonzalez: All this. Yeah. Mm-hmm.
Ryan: That was a good one too.
Sarah Gonzalez: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Ryan: yeah, you're
Coley: But I I think with with so much fast forwarding in today's in today's world, the the commercial is is losing its you like you have to get somebody's attention in like two three
Ryan: Yeah.
Coley: seconds. They're no longer these thirty second commercials. So
Sarah Gonzalez: Well, that's so when I did that episode, I was like asking like a marketing expert. And I was like, Is it me? Like, am I just like that old lady now that's like back in my day the commercials were amazing. Like
Ryan: huh.
Sarah Gonzalez: and I was like, or was there like actually something better about them? And she was like, Well, I think it's both. I think it's like part of your nostalgia, like it's part of your childhood. And so you have this like these like fond feelings about it because it's was my lived experience. But she was like, But also the nineties because of where the nineties sat like technologically, it was for a lot of people like those commercials just don't exist anymore. But the nineties were also the last time really when we all would like collectively watch the same commercials.
Ryan: That's true.
Sarah Gonzalez: Like we would like sit down and we all knew these jingles and we all because we all would be like, and now we're waiting for like Saved by the Bell to come back on and we watch that commercial
Ryan: Mm-hmm.
Sarah Gonzalez: and we all knew them. And now it's like our algorithms give us different ads, and we'd like I might see a commercial that you will never ever see.
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: And so
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: like the nineties were the last time that we were all like being mass marketed to. Like now it's like more like niche marketing, like they're gonna market to me on Instagram. these pairs of
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: pants or this litter shirt or
Coley: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: whatever. And like whatever you're getting, I will probably never see and not know.
Ryan: And plus we're getting, you know, we would just see ads on TV and hear it on radio, but now it's in our face twenty four seven with everything. You click on it, it's an ad. It's an ad. It's this. It's that. So you gotta click out of that. So it's just I feel like it's more like you said, targeted, but they're just hitting everyone like twenty X or fifty X constantly than
Sarah Gonzalez: Constantly. Yeah. Yeah.
Coley: It's the algorithm.
Ryan: what it was. Yeah. Nah, but yeah, let's I mean, I think it's interesting, but now if it's all right, I wanted to kinda transition a little bit to the the podcast where you were talking about how companies are kinda sneaking chemicals into our foods and you know, if you're willing to talk about that a bit, I was first off I was wondering what how that popped up on your radar and how that became of interest to you to kind of look into it more.
Sarah Gonzalez: Mm-hmm. So, like a couple years ago, I kind of got on like a consumer protection beat kick. Like what I was gonna focus on as a reporter is like consumer protection-y stuff. And I was like, I think it was like around the time that I had my first kid, and I was like, I don't want like certain chemicals and around my household. Like I want clothes or
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: like laundry detergent that's like not
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: gonna poison this like little baby who's like slobbering all over my clothes or whatever. and then I started just like paying more attention for my own personal reasons. and then started becoming interested. Like I feel like at our show, Planet Money, we're a lot of hosts and we all sort of have different interests, and we all kind of like follow our own natural curiosities and do whatever stories like appeal to us. And so, like
Ryan: Sure.
Sarah Gonzalez: often whatever I become interested in as a person or consumer or whatever, I end being like. Hmm, like what's the story? I like I used to start being like, there's like a story here, and I can like talk about this stuff. and so I just started doing like interviews about like certain additives. Like I was like at one point I was like, maybe I'm gonna do like a profile of an additive, like one additive,
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: like what was like the lobbying that went into that went into like getting this one additive to be allowed into our food? Like Who's who's like the interested parties and like who do they fight for and how does like that work? and then I was like, I don't want to like single out like any one additive. And
Coley: Mm-hmm.
Sarah Gonzalez: then like really the problem is like all of the additives. And so the the title of that episode was like how sneaky chemicals, how food companies are allowed to sneak chemicals into our food or something like that. But chemicals is just like a word for. You can also call it additives
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: or ingredients. It's just like new things that have been invented in a lab. They're like brand
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: new ingredients or additives or chemicals or whatever you want to call it. And you're like, we've invented
Coley: Ha ha ha.
Sarah Gonzalez: this new thing in a lab. And now we're gonna put it into our food and and say that it does this thing. And so it was it the show that episode is about like everything that would fall under that umbrella term of like an additive or an ingredient or a chemical. and some feel more chemically than others, right? Cause like
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: everything is technically considered an additive, like a banana is considered an additive if it's added to food. but
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: what we focused on was like new additives that had never been used in food before. And how like if you've just created a brand new chemical, if you're like a chemical maker or a food maker and you've just invented a brand new ingredient, how does that get into the food supply? What's the role of the Food and Drug Administration which exists to protect consumers against harmful food and drugs? like
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: what's their role? And it's like, turns out, kind of chill. But it's like it's like there's a lot of it's a it's a lot of like the honor system.
Ryan: interesting. Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: Which I can talk I can talk more about if you if you'd like.
Ryan: Yeah, well I was gonna we can kind of circle on that. I was like I I see this phrase that grass loophole, right? and I was I was just curious like what year that came in, how it how it came about, like you know, what it means, you know, maybe are a lot of cause I've asked people about this, like as I've dug into this more, nobody knows about it at all.
Sarah Gonzalez: Well, okay, so in some circles people know a lot about it, right? But I think general
Ryan: Sure, sure.
Sarah Gonzalez: general public maybe not. But okay, so the FDA created this big or like there was this Congress passed this big food additives law in nineteen fifty-eight, I believe. And so technically
Ryan: Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: in nineteen fifty-eight, we said, like, if you're a food company and you're gonna introduce a brand new ingredient that's never been used in food before, the FDA, you have to sh prove to them that your new additive or ingredient or chemical is safe. And The FDA is gonna sign off on it. But it was taking the FDA like a really long time to sign off on these kinds of things, so to speak. It was taking a long time for them to review every new ingredient. And over time, people, companies, and the FDA started sort of being like, we think that built into this law is an exception for things that are generally recognized as safe, G R A S or GRASS. And so they were like, if things are generally recognized as safe, the FDA shouldn't have to be like bogged down for years to review like flour or vinegar or sugar. And so some people in this, like experts in this industry, will say like generally recognized as safe food ingredients were supposed to be for like sugar, a banana, flour. Like you don't have to review that. but the language was kind of like loosey-goosey, and so it could have been interpreted to be like whatever you want it to be, kind of. And so over the years, it got interpreted to mean that like you as a food maker or food company, you can say like, this new ingredient is generally recognized as safe according to our in-house scientists. which like there's some conflict potential conflict of interest there if your scientists that you pay are the ones that say it is safe. And The FDA doesn't have to look at that to confirm anything because we're just like trusting you and your in-house scientists, right? Probably most of the time it's fine and they're they're doing the right studies and whatever, but
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: sometimes they're not. And things slip through the cracks. And our episode focuses on a woman who is one of 42 women who had to have their gallbladders removed after they consumed a brand new chemical that had never been used in food before and turned out to not be really safe for some humans. And so
Ryan: wow. Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: and and the the way that it happened was that company was like it's generally recognized as safe. So therefore the FDA doesn't have to review it. So that is the grass loophole. It's like if we self-certify that our brand new ingredient is safe, the FDA doesn't have to look at it. But what's more interesting, I think to me, is that this is how the process can work. You can say, like, I have a brand new ingredient, I'm certifying that it's generally recognized as safe for humans to eat. but I want to be a good party. I want the FDA to know about it so you can notify the FDA. Just FYI, this new grass ingredient is gonna be in like a smoothie or a granola or whatever. And the FDA can look at that and go, like, I don't know, this chemical actually looks similar to this other chemical that we know got causes cancer. Like, does yours also cause cancer? Or like, how much of this chemical or ingredient are you using? Because it depends on like how much it might be problematic. And then you, the food company, can be like, that's too many questions. We were just, we were just trying to be nice and share this with you. You're now asking way too many questions. We are going to retract our notice, pretend like you did not hear about our chemical, and then you just use it in food anyway. And so people actually call that the secret grass loophole. Because grass means I tell the FDA that it's safe and I use it if I want to. Secret grass is you don't tell the FDA anything. You just put your brand new ingredient in food without telling the FDA ever, and they have no idea. and 99% of the chemicals that are in our food right now were added through the grass loophole, either the grass or secret grass loophole. So, what was like it's like there's been like in the past recent 24 years, there's been like 900 new brand new chemicals introduced to food. And only 10 of them went through the FDA review process. The rest were like, we're just gonna say that they're safe. but like you don't normally hear from a bunch of people getting super sick from food, right? Like it's not like at one point in the interviewing process, I was like, listen, I'm 38 years old. I've been eating food my whole entire life. And like, I haven't been poisoned. Like my gallbladder's in there, like nothing has happened.
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: And this lawyer who fo who focuses on food regulation, she was like, I think people are getting sick all the time from the food. It's just that they're not getting immediately sick, like they did in the case of the gallbladder.
Ryan: That's what I was thinking. Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: But she was like, it's really hard to trace back the effect of some of these chemicals on our bodies over the long term. Like in in some cases, when you eat a thing and you get sick immediately, that's like The easiest case and in some ways
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: like best case scenario, because you can identify it immediately and pull it off the shelves, right? If there's no immediate effect, it's like a little more tricky, a little more complicated. and so her she said something that was really great that didn't make it into the episode, but she was like, When I was first starting studying law, I took like a consumer protection law class, and the professor was like, Americans can buy whatever stupid thing they want. Like they're entitled to buy whatever stupid thing they want, but like they should know. what it is and decide if they still wanna buy it, right? Like and I was like, hmm, that seems like, you know, like like more like consumers her thing was like consumers should at least know what the potential consequences might be.
Ryan: Right. And did you get into any like of like how in certain communities maybe some people aren't don't have the education or the understanding, you know, of chemicals or whatever, and then they're just
Sarah Gonzalez: I think nobody has a good understanding of what's in our food. Like it's so hard. Like, even if you're tr like,
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: I remember me trying to be like a better consumer than I have been in the past when I became a mom. And I was like, it's really hard to find like to know if you're doing and it you'll it's just it you'll overwhelm yourself trying to figure out if any if what you put in your body is like good for you. You know, I mean like I try to be like Vegetables, fruit, like not a ton of prepackaged foods. Yeah, like
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: Whole Foods? Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: that's your best bet. I would think th that that's what people say.
Ryan: But there are, you know, obviously a lot of people that just can't, you know, whole foods and organic things cost a lot of money, right? So there are a lot of people that just might only be able to shop at a convenience store, right? And then look at all the chemicals that you know, in a Twix bar or Skittles or whatever. But yeah, I get it. It's
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah. I mean, what's in our food and then access and affordability of food are like two totally different things. and we've done episodes on like food deserts and things
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: on like people who rely on like dollar stores to to for their food, which like honestly the dollar store is my favorite store in the whole entire world. Like I've always been like a dollar tree girl.
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: There's one right by me that I like. Yeah. I like it too. I like it. Same.
Sarah Gonzalez: but like not for like necessarily I don't I have been I have not had to rely on it exclusively for like my groceries, right? It's more like it's like fun like to be like, I got ten bucks, what am I gonna buy at Dollar Tree, you know?
Ryan: Yeah.
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: Yeah. Do you know if there are any like any studies out there that are that are kind of tracking some of these, you know, over time some of these chemicals and like maybe certain subsets of people that are getting various diseases or whatever? Is there anything like that that you're able to
Sarah Gonzalez: There's so many. The way that that I have so we did a part, kind of like a part two to the food episode, which is about supplements. So just to
Ryan: Uh-huh. Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: like close the loop on the grass loophole, food is considered so much more unregulated than like supplements, like protein powder is creatine, melatonin, like all that kind of stuff.
Coley: Interesting.
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: That if you are a chemical maker or whatever and you've just invented a new supplement or you've just created a new extract and you're gonna have like green tea extract or whatever it might be for a supplement, and you try to get it approved through by the FDA or whatever, like the one like the conventional wisdom is that it is so hard to get a new ingredient approved for use in a supplement that
Ryan: Mm-hmm.
Sarah Gonzalez: lawyers will tell supplement companies. Put that new ingredient in a food product first, because food is easy. You can just self-certify that it's generally recognized as safe. So, like if you have a supplement, put it in like a granola bar or a smoothie. And now it's a food product, not a supplement, but it's still that same brand new ingredient that has never been like vetted by a third party or by the FDA at least. and so they will put it in a food product first. Now it's on the market. Now it's like considered having been on the market. And so Now it's not a new dietary ingredient, and you can just put it in a supplement without having to go through the FDA process. And so on the studies point, there are a lot of studies where people are trying to link certain negative health effects on the human body for like certain link certain supplements. But a lot of these things are like mixed. Like one supplement will
Ryan: Mm.
Sarah Gonzalez: be like it has some of this and some of this and some of that and some of that. And then you're like, How it's like very hard for scientists to like isolate. It's this one part of the supplement that is causing the problem. And I imagine the same is true for food. Like in processed foods, there's just so many things in there. Like, how do you even isolate the thing? And like who is even gonna be held responsible 20, 30, 40 years from now when you're getting sick after repeat exposures over your whole life? Like the
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: People in charge of that company are probably be long gone or like not in charge
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: anymore. Like it's just like,
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: and who's gonna fund these studies? Like who is the person that's gonna be like, I'm gonna study the effect on of this chemical on the human body over fifty years to see if it causes cancer? Like who is gonna do that? Who's gonna fund that study?
Ryan: Right. But I feel like I notice we have like certain dyes in foods and certain things that are just absolutely horrible where it's just like, why is this even you know, and now and now companies are starting to put like on like I've seen it on on Doritos bags recently. They're like all natural, you know? That's like before it's like nothing you know, it's like how how
Sarah Gonzalez: yeah. Right. Like it's like yeah. It's like the cheat the like chips that don't have any of the like red spr orange sprinklings or whatever. Okay, you wanna hear a really depressing story that is
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: not in my well not depressing, but like kind of. it wasn't in the episode. I don't wanna get it wrong. I think it was Fruit Loops. Okay, so there was a time
Ryan: don't don't crush my don't crush my my fruit now I'm kidding.
Sarah Gonzalez: Hold on, what
Coley: You're
Sarah Gonzalez: was it?
Coley: gonna ruin Frulloops for Ryan forever.
Ryan: Ha ha ha.
Sarah Gonzalez: I think it was, hold on, let me check my notes very quickly.
Ryan: That was all the all the all the cereals we grew up with as kids, but Apple Jacks, Cookie Crisp.
Sarah Gonzalez: I know, I know. I wonder if they were wonder if people were if they you always used those also. I think it was Fruit Loops, but let me not hold on, hold on, hold on. Yeah, it was Fruit Loops. Okay.
Ryan: Mm.
Sarah Gonzalez: wait, was it? Of course I don't
Ryan: Lucky Charms?
Sarah Gonzalez: have my notes like readily accessible right now.
Ryan: you're fine.
Sarah Gonzalez: okay, but here's the story. So there was like a time when
Ryan: Mm-hmm.
Sarah Gonzalez: people were starting to revolt against against like food colorings. Like they like, we want it to be more all natural. We want it to be like whatever, whatever, whatever. and so Kellogg or General Mills? No,
Ryan: Mm.
Sarah Gonzalez: I can't tell you the story without actually knowing the details. So give me one second, because then we can't
Ryan: take your time, yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: just name the wrong company. Okay.
Ryan: I want to hear this for sure.
Sarah Gonzalez: Well now I've set it up so Yeah. Yeah. It was Fruit Loops and it's Kellogg.
Ryan: Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: No, that's them they're removing it again now. my gosh, maybe I shouldn't tell you the story 'cause I can't. Okay. Give me one more second. Is this bad? Are you gonna edit all this out? Or is everyone just waiting for me to give you the find my notes?
Ryan: Sure. No, no, no. We're I'm I'm I can't wait. I'm still I'm very excited.
Coley: Ha ha.
Sarah Gonzalez: Your your Okay, I'm just gonna have to do it without the full details, but there's a colorful cereal company. Okay.
Ryan: Mm.
Sarah Gonzalez: Use your imagination. there's okay, so there was a time when American consumers started like really revolting against artificial dyes, and we were like, we don't want them in our food, we don't want them in our food. And then like the cereal company is like, I'm gonna give the people what they want and we're gonna like remove artificial dyes. We're only gonna use like natural food coloring. So like
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: Turmeric to make it yellow and whatever. and consumers hated it, weren't buying the cereal anymore. They were like, this is dull, it's lifeless, my childhood is ruined. It's like the colors are all muted. It was like lavender and beige and light orange, not like blu bright blue and bright green and bright red. And like dyes don't contribute to taste. It's literally just the look.
Ryan: yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: And they're like this
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: c you know, the the brand is like trying to meet consumer preferences. And then the people are like, no, no, no, bring the artificial dyes back. We don't like how it looks. I was like, what a telling anecdote, because sometimes you're like, you wanna kind of, I think some people it's like, let's blame the companies or whatever,
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: but like they're also giving people what we are willing to accept and pay for, you know, like and sometimes. Consumers will say they want a thing and then when they're given that thing, they s literally stop buying it as much and they want
Ryan: That's true.
Sarah Gonzalez: the bad thing again. Or, you know, not to say that dyes are bad, but the thing that they had thought they didn't want.
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: so it's like it's hard it's hard to like I like what do you I I mean, I think advocates will say, like, at the very least, we should consumers should be able to know. what the potential effects of certain food products are. And then if
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: they wanna still buy them, they can buy them. But like let us know
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: is I think what some people believe.
Ryan: Got it. Got it. And one more question. I know we've taken up too much of your time here and you've been super gracious. So this episode suggests kind of the system relies heavily on companies kind of policing themselves. what economic incentives make that system attract attractive to regulators in industry, do you think?
Sarah Gonzalez: Like why do they choose to do it their own way, then through the long FDA
Ryan: Yeah, yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: re review process? So okay, I mean, if you don't have to notify the FDA. And wait a year, two years, back in the day, three years, like what what is the incentive to notify them? And also, like, if you if it turns out that you your food ingredient caused some kind of real damage, besides getting sued by like a private attorney, the FDA doesn't go like you don't get to be a food company now, you like didn't do your diligent like, you know, you didn't like look at things properly, and so now we're gonna like fine you or not let you sell food anymore. Like, there's not a whole lot of consequence. And so what is the incentive to wait potentially years to get the FDA to review something? You know? On on the flip side though, like You could argue, people argue that regulation, more regulation, more review would slow down innovation, right? We have so many options, so many food options. Like our aisles, our grocery store aisles are filled with so many, so many options.
Ryan: Too much.
Sarah Gonzalez: Because regulations are not getting in the way. And so, like, what are the trade-offs? Do you want to have a world where you have like three serial options or whatever, 20 serial options, or like 200 serial options? you know, like I think some people want like innovation can happen sometimes because there's not a ton of regulation getting in the way. Right? And so like and if you go back to like the origins, 'cause I was like, when did additives like become a thing? When are we when did like we really start putting them into food? And do you wanna guess? Does anybody do you guys know when like additives became a thing?
Ryan: I'm gonna guess in like the
Coley: Mm nineteen fifty something?
Ryan: sev sixties.
Sarah Gonzalez: After around World War II. So it was like
Ryan: Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: all a lot of the men are leaving to go to war. Women
Ryan: Mm-hmm.
Sarah Gonzalez: are no longer, they're now entering the workforce. They don't have that much time to stay at home and cook things from scratch. And so the market
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: identifies this need for shelf-stable food. And that's when we see like a ton of innovation in the like food chemical space. That's when we start getting shelf-stable foods with like preservatives and and stuff in them. And it's like, It was meant to fill a real need. Like we needed shelf stable food during the war to send to the troops, right? And so it's like
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: like there's a time and a place, I guess. and like not a ton of regulation standing in the way is kind of what got us to like ramp up our food or you know, add all these new food products to shelves around World War Two.
Ryan: I mean it's super interesting and you know, first off, well, we appreciate your your time like coming in. It was it was so nice to to hear about life in the nineties and you know, you guys have such a an influential show with Planet Money and you know, I can't even imagine what it's like to to be one of the the co hosts on that. So just wanna say you're doing an awesome job and
Sarah Gonzalez: No, thanks.
Ryan: you know, it's super nice to to to kinda to get to know you a bit and thanks thanks again for coming on.
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah, thanks so much for having me in Talking Nineties and Food Safety.
Ryan: Yeah, for sure. And you know, we got that Greensboro connection too, so I'm gonna go kinda look into if any of my high that's what I've done.
Sarah Gonzalez: Maybe I'll see you. Maybe I'll see you at cookout one day.
Coley: my gosh.
Ryan: don't even get me started on cookout, man. I wish they had a
Sarah Gonzalez: Don't even get me started on cookout. They're watermelon milkshake.
Ryan: yeah. I mean in in the in the actual like cost of it all is like nothing compared to something in California or Colorado. Like you can get a whole meal.
Sarah Gonzalez: I feel like everything is expensive everywhere now. Like everything
Ryan: It it
Sarah Gonzalez: is expensive everywhere.
Ryan: Yeah, it is it's going up too quick, but that won't stop us from joining our cookout from time to time. So Well, we'll let you get
Sarah Gonzalez: See you there at midnight w as when cookout should be consumed.
Ryan: Exactly. Exactly. Well again, thank you. you know, this was this was Sarah Gonzalez from from Planet Money. And you can find us offline days, offline D A Z E Facebook, TikTok, Instagram. And we're signing off after this wonder wonderful interview and hope you have a a great rest of your day, Sarah.
Sarah Gonzalez: Thanks you guys too. Bye.
Ryan: All right, bye.
Coley: Yes.
Coley: I'm Coley and check it out. I got a I got a hat off on days. Yeah.
Ryan: Yeah, we got some merch there. So all right. and today we are so excited to have Sarah Gonzalez, who is a host and reporter for Planet Money. NPR's acclaimed podcast, kind of known for making the the complex forces shaping the economy more engaging, accessible, and entertaining. we wanted to bring her on to discuss, you know, first off her experiences growing up pre-internet internet, then kind of segment into a a recent podcast episode that investigates the sneaky ways companies try to get chemicals into our foods here in the US. So thanks for for joining us, Sarah. How are ya?
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah, I'm good. Thanks for having me.
Ryan: Yeah, yeah. So go ahead, Callie.
Coley: What w what the heck are you doing on our show? You're so it's
Sarah Gonzalez: Listen, I'm a nineties kid. I was like, they're nineties guys. I'm just gonna I'm just gonna stop by. no, I was I was happy that you guys asked. We we love talking to other shows.
Ryan: That's awesome. So what do you so I guess first off, where where were you? Were you born? East coast, west coast, or what w where were you born?
Sarah Gonzalez: West Coast, San Diego, California girl. Grew up on the border. I feel like I'm a border girl, really, both both
Ryan: Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: Tijuana and San Diego. but I mean I mainly San Diego, obviously. well, I'm not obviously, but
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: Ha ha ha.
Sarah Gonzalez: mainly San Diego. and yeah, I mean born in the born in the eighties, but like nineties kid, because I was like a baby in the late eighties. So nineties are my were my coming of age years, you know.
Ryan: Right. So what do you kind of looking back, reflecting, what do you remember most from the nineties?
Sarah Gonzalez: like calling people on a landline, like, hi, can Samantha is Samantha there? Can she come to the phone calling my mom at work and being like, Hi, is Aita there? I it's her daughter. I need to ask her card being like super nervous to call your mom at work, which is insane that we even did that. Like, and you'd
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: just be like put on hold and listen to like elevator music and then you'd be like, Do you want me to put this in the fridge? And my mom would be like, Why are you calling me
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: for this thing? So, like phone calls, I think were a big, a big one. Like boys calling you, you calling boys, like all that kind of stuff was just like, it wasn't so secretive. Like the whole household would be like, Luis is calling
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: Sarah, you know? And like that was like fun.
Coley: Did did you ever
Ryan: Was there like a gatekeeper involved? Like where because I feel like whenever whenever I would call, I would call like, you know, house, you know, the dad might have picked up the phone. He's like, Who is this calling?
Sarah Gonzalez: Not my house. My I had a cool house. My parents were cool.
Ryan: Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: but other people like me calling other people was like nerve-wracking because I people I feel like other parents were just like more strict or formal, and my my mom's like super informal and chill, and my dad just deferred to my mom. but yeah, so phone calls was a very, very big one. Even like ordering food and I remember being like to my sister, like, No, you do it, you order the pizza, no you'd be like No, no, you and then with the ring you'd like, and you're like ham the phone, like, No,
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: like you do 'cause you're just like chicken out. I don't know why phone calls were such a big deal as a kid, but they were for me. And then like Yeah, good.
Coley: Yeah, was I was gonna ask you if if you ever like prepped, like I remember prepping for like making that phone call to that girl or making that phone call and be like, all right, I gotta say it, it's gotta be quick, it's gotta be, you know, you you might have the gatekeeper. You you absolutely would have the gatekeeper on some of the some of the things and be like, it's gotta be quick, and then I we gotta get on, and then but but people would still like pick up the phone and like listen to your conversations.
Sarah Gonzalez: Well we'll pe then like someone else in the house would pick up and you'd be like, I'm on the phone, I'm talking to so and so. And then that was like embarrassing. Yeah, I would prep.
Ryan: Ha ha ha.
Sarah Gonzalez: I remember mainly prepping
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: for like for like placing like a pickup order. Like a pe like like it'd like two large pepperoni pizza, like just two large pepperoni pizza, and then you go and then you're just like buckle under pressure and you'd like hand the phone off to somebody else. what else do I miss and mainly remind and then like like innocent childhood pranks.
Ryan: Mm.
Sarah Gonzalez: I feel like no one does those kinds of things. Well, I don't know. I don't think people like TP each other's houses anymore. No, right?
Coley: My what No. My daughter tries
Ryan: yeah.
Coley: to prank call me now, but it comes up as her f her name on my phone. And sh she's eight and so sh she
Sarah Gonzalez: Old is she? Yeah. You're like, let me show you caller D. yeah, Caller AD killed so much. It the suspense
Coley: She she she calls me yeah so much.
Sarah Gonzalez: of like, is it gonna be them? Is like it just it ruined the suspense and killed killed some joy, I think. There, yeah.
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: I'm gonna try to bring I have two little girls, and I they're
Ryan: Outer ears.
Sarah Gonzalez: like little, like they're two and four. Well, one's almost five, so two and almost five. And I'm like plotting how I'm gonna teach them to do like the fun 90s, like, you know, when you like get when you're like older, like preteen teenager, and you're like at a red light and you like get out of the car and run around the car. You know, like those kinds of things.
Coley: Ha ha.
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: which actually might be and like maybe that's actually dangerous. So they'd be like walking on the
Coley: Ha ha ha.
Sarah Gonzalez: but like on a small side street, maybe at a stop sign. Yeah.
Coley: Wait, were those called Chinese fire drills? Is that does that ring a bell? Is that I it's a I'm sure it's probably not politically correct, but
Sarah Gonzalez: Is that what they're called? Problematic name. Probably not. I don't remember them having a
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: name, but I remember doing it as like a 12 or 13-year-old and thinking it was like the coolest.
Ryan: Did you ever t toilet paper someone's house?
Sarah Gonzalez: I didn't because I was like a good kid, but I think we would do it like we would do like small to our friends. Like I'd like TP her bush. And then like they'd
Ryan: yeah, yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: do it back and but like we all knew, like we'd be like, they're gonna come over and like do this, like whatever. but I feel like that was just so innocent. Or like ding dong ditching, that one you have to do with your kids, I feel like.
Ryan: yeah, yeah. You had to be quick. You had to be quick though, you know, just like just light on the feet, maybe a few trees around,
Sarah Gonzalez: Mm-hmm.
Ryan: go hide around back. Yeah, I definitely remember that.
Coley: That is Violet's new favorite game right now, is she likes to ding dong ditch. So at least we have that going for us.
Sarah Gonzalez: Interesting. Yeah.
Ryan: I called it ring and run.
Coley: Ring and run.
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: where are you guys from? Mm Denver.
Coley: Right here, Denver.
Ryan: C Denver C yeah. And I'm I'm from North
Sarah Gonzalez: You guys just had different names for it.
Ryan: North Carolina.
Sarah Gonzalez: what part?
Ryan: Yeah, so I'm from I'm from Greensboro but lived in Raleigh for many years.
Sarah Gonzalez: My husband's from Greensboro. I love Greensboro.
Ryan: Shut the front door, are you serious?
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah. The the Greensboro Airport and this where my husband's from and the San Diego airport are like the two best airports in the they're like the easiest airports ever. It's like there's never anyone there. It's like small and
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: totally manageable and like clean and anyways, yeah. I love Greensboro. It's so green.
Ryan: In and out. Where did he go to where did he go to high school?
Sarah Gonzalez: I know that there's Paige I know that there's Paige, but Paige was the fancy school. Was Paige the
Ryan: Sorry to put you put you on the Yeah, Paige Grimsley. Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: fancy school or Grimsley was the fan fancy school?
Ryan: Maybe I don't think Grims Grimsley, Page, I went to Northwest, which was like the the kind of back backwoods school.
Sarah Gonzalez: No, he didn't go to that one. He like talks about his friends and they were like, he went to like Page and that was the fancy school, but I don't remember which one was the fancy one. It was you just went to one
Ryan: Yeah, I th
Sarah Gonzalez: of the public schools there.
Ryan: Got it. Yeah, that's and when did he when did he graduate? I'm trying to like make myself seem super old so I can just get a
Sarah Gonzalez: He is like three years older than me. So graduate
Ryan: Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: high school. I graduated high school in 2005, so he probably did like 2002-ish. maybe you guys know each other. I'm gonna ask him.
Ryan: Okay. That's not I could have I'm two thousand, so I mean it's I mean it could've I mean it could have been in the same same circles or, you know, you know someone that knows someone type deal, but
Sarah Gonzalez: do you know who Ty Tysinger is?
Ryan: That does not ring a bell, but I feel like I if I knew that that's a
Sarah Gonzalez: Okay. I th that's like my my husband's best friend, but his parents are like, you know, they'd always like write op eds at the newspaper. And so I was like, maybe they
Ryan: Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: maybe that rings a bell for you. But my husband's name is Steven Lasseter, if that rings a bell.
Ryan: No. Steven. Okay. W Lassiter. Okay. Stephen L I'm gonna I'm gonna make note of that and do some research on my end.
Sarah Gonzalez: And his he has a older brother who's actually probably closer to you,
Ryan: it's such a random place like Greensboro, you know.
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: So that's
Sarah Gonzalez: It is it is it's not common that I meet someone from Greensboro. Yeah.
Ryan: Yeah. No, that's that's cool though. So what so what kind of what kind of kid were you growing up? Like were you adventurous? Were you more kind of just reserved? Were you
Sarah Gonzalez: Like like elementary school age or like high school age?
Ryan: Yeah, yeah. Like 'cause I'm gonna start the elementary and then I'm gonna kinda segment into the to the formidable high school years.
Sarah Gonzalez: elementary school, I was not shy, not reserved. I was like writing speeches, doing speech competitions. I like knew I wanted to be a reporter when I was in third grade.
Ryan: cool.
Sarah Gonzalez: because I liked writing and I liked performing. And I was like, well, this is the two things combined. And my mom was like, You're a genius. I
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: Ha ha.
Sarah Gonzalez: was like eight, and I was like, I figured it out, and she was like, Wow, prodigy.
Coley: Ha ha
Ryan: That's funny.
Sarah Gonzalez: I was just like a like a I don't know. bubbly little like talkative outgoing girl. I guess I'm one of four girls. and I had two
Ryan: Nice. Okay. So no brothers?
Sarah Gonzalez: little sisters that were like my baby dolls, you
Ryan: No.
Sarah Gonzalez: know, so I was like playing with them when I was in elementary school and yeah. No brothers, all girls.
Ryan: That's got it. Yeah, I have just one brother and I felt like definitely it could have benefit, you know, on the female knowledge side having like a sister.
Sarah Gonzalez: Every time I meet guys, I'm always like, You had a sister? And they're like, I have three, right? And I'm Yeah, you act like you had or
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: they'll be like, I moisturized. And I'm like, You moisturize? Like, okay, you had someone help you and guide you.
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: and then actually just like speaking of tech, elementary school was like the Tamagotchi era. So we did
Ryan: Mm.
Sarah Gonzalez: have, remember the little like the little like pagery looking whatever animals that you took care of?
Ryan: Yep. I do.
Coley: The ones you tried to keep alive.
Sarah Gonzalez: I don't think I I don't think I had one, but I played with other people's. But
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: that was like the beginning of like tech addiction for our generation.
Ryan: Oof, oof.
Coley: I had the knockoff ones were which were called Giga Pets. Yeah. Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: gig up, I remember those. I didn't know they were gig I didn't know they were knockoffs.
Coley: I think the Tamagotchi ones were the exciting ones that everybody wanted. And then Giga.
Ryan: I did have a pager, which is embarrassing to say, but
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: That's not I my sister had a pager. My older sister I never did, but I wish I could say that I had one. I always wanted one. Like the clear ones where you could see the wires in them. I was always like, those
Ryan: yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: are so cool.
Coley: Ha ha ha.
Ryan: And I can't imagine there was anything ever important like it's like yeah, I really need to get to this because I need to go meet my friend at the arcade and we're gonna go play some video games.
Sarah Gonzalez: But like I remember I don't know. I guess my sister would like page me on other people's pages because I remember like going to the payphone payphone in middle school, like the payphone on campus at like my middle school to like call my to like page my sister and then she would call like we would I don't know how we would call from like sh you could like call a payphone, I guess.
Ryan: yeah. Yeah. Huh.
Sarah Gonzalez: And you and like 'cause then it'd be like, hey, Sash, like in the middle of like the schoolyard and yeah. So and I don't know, I feel like those are it like taught a lot of independence. Like I can't
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: like you would like ask people for the phone and like I don't even know who'd like taught you how to use a payphone. You just like started using payphones and paging people. I don't know.
Ryan: I agree. I agree. It was
Sarah Gonzalez: But we were so little on payphones.
Ryan: Well we had to I mean, I feel
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: like we kinda had to grow up a little bit earlier in that in that era, which, you know, I think we were afforded yeah, in that sense. But also right. But I feel like we also
Sarah Gonzalez: In that sense, not in other sense, like not in like makeup and stuff, which is more like today's world.
Ryan: had more of a leash from a hey, go out and play with your friends, go kinda like explore a little bit more versus today. 'cause I can definitely remember like just riding bikes in the neighborhood and doing all that kind of stuff until the sun went down and then it was better be home situation. so what was your kind of favorite way to waste a entire Saturday? You know, think about in high school before the internet existed.
Sarah Gonzalez: I mean, I was like a cheerleader in high school. So I had a lot of cheer practices on Saturday
Ryan: Okay. Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: or like cheer obligations of like we're performing at this like community event or you know, things like that. so I think sports took up a decent amount of my after school and weekends. and like the mall. We just like went
Ryan: Course.
Sarah Gonzalez: to the mall a lot. Yeah, and the movies. Those were like that was where you went. We didn't even that's like pre-Starbucks, you know what I mean? Like we didn't even like go
Ryan: Course, yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: get coffee. Like we just didn't have anything to do or anywhere to go except them all.
Ryan: No. I mean, it was we have an episode on that too, because it the mall was a coming of age place, right? Do you do you remember a couple of your where would you hang out of the mall or favorite stores or or things like that that may not exist anymore?
Sarah Gonzalez: We pe so I don't know about you do you guys remember like Star Shots?
Ryan: I think was
Coley: No.
Ryan: that a is that pizza?
Sarah Gonzalez: Maybe you guys had a different age. So at in my circles in Southern California
Ryan: Mm-hmm.
Sarah Gonzalez: or in San Diego. Well, yeah, Southern California, because like our LA family would do the same thing. You would go to take pictures with your friends and the backdrop, you remember? And the backdrop's always like hearts or like smile now, cry
Coley: Yeah, I remember it. Yeah.
Ryan: Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: later, or like whatever. And then you would just like go and not smile, and you'd be like, And then everyone was just like just a bunch of like eleven and twelve and thirteen year olds just like paying to not smile in pictures. And then they would like pose you
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: like this for like back to back. And and then we'd have it was like the original Instagram. We would like
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: put our and your binder used to have like all the little like slots for just star shot pictures, and you'd get like four rows of your friends and your binder was just front and back, like star shots of your friends, and now it's like Instagram is where you show your pictures, but We used to walk around with them on our binders.
Coley: Ha ha.
Ryan: What about like clothing stores that you y maybe used to shop at that potentially don't exist today? I can think of a few off the top of my head, but Or maybe that
Sarah Gonzalez: What? G name some.
Ryan: not exist today, but they're So no, I guess they do still exist. Like Abercrombie and Gap and things like that, like they're they're kinda
Sarah Gonzalez: All them they all exist, but there was they were like the thing, you know? I they were like
Ryan: Yeah, they were massive back then, yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: yeah, like they didn't they used to have like models in their windows and with like no shirts
Ryan: yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: on or something like that. Like the guys, didn't they used to like I don't remember, but I just yeah, I think they're all still around, but they're not sorry, my alarm is going off.
Ryan: you're good.
Sarah Gonzalez: they're all still around, but they just don't they're not like the trend like they were back then.
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: Agreed. What about music
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah.
Ryan: music wise? What kinda what kind of what kind of jams were you bumping, you know, back in the day?
Sarah Gonzalez: I'm I have potentially embarrassing tastes in music, I would say. I have like like
Ryan: let's hear it.
Coley: No you no you don't.
Sarah Gonzalez: old man music tastes.
Ryan: Ooh, okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: but I like it all. Like I someone told me that it's like called yacht rock recently, which I didn't know, but I'm like a yacht rock girl for sure. It's like the music
Ryan: yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: that I listen to my parents and my aunts and
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: uncles listen
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: to, right? That it ha I have like fond memories of that kind of music. And then of course like
Coley: The like sixties and seventies music.
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah.
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah. Sixties and seventies music and then like Mexican music and it's like what we like call like Sunday morning cleaning music where it's like Sunday morning you put on certain Mexican songs and everyone cleans the house on Sunday. and then like obviously like nineties hip hop and our like that's you know, like of course,
Ryan: Ooh. Yeah. Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: a bunch of songs we probably should not have been listening to as preteens. We're like
Ryan: Remember the old the parental advisory kind of little sticker you try to buy like a C D or something?
Sarah Gonzalez: Do they not have those anymore? They must still have those.
Ryan: I don't I haven't bought an well, I mean they don't do they sell do they still sell C Ds?
Sarah Gonzalez: CD
Coley: They they have a little
Sarah Gonzalez: CDs are back now, Ryan. All this stuff is coming. The isn't the flip phone coming back or is like is they're
Ryan: shoot I feel like
Coley: They are.
Sarah Gonzalez: trying to make that back? Yeah.
Coley: The songs have a little E next to That's the only reason I know that.
Sarah Gonzalez: explicit.
Coley: The only reason I know that is because my daughter goes, Dad, do you wanna know how I know how this song has cussing in it? And I said, How? And she goes, There's a little E next to it. And I said, Yeah, that makes sense. That makes sense. Cause I can t I told her that she can cuss in when she sings. That's that's our rule. That she can she can do it when she's frustrated, she can do it when she's singing, and she but she can't do it at a person. And so
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah, that sounds like great parenting advice. Just don't cuss at people. Sounds good. Yeah.
Coley: Right. Yeah.
Ryan: Yeah. And that's yeah, so music and I mean it was just I feel like it's just a different world that we live in now, you know? Like like I feel like we've we've traveled like five hundred years in twenty years is what it feels like to me.
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah, but then also like going then it's sometimes I feel like we're going backwards in time. Like I'm like, we used to write letters and then we invented telephones to call people and now we're just like texting again. And I'm like, we should just call more. Like we're going backwards sometimes. There you go.
Coley: Now we're we're we're back to hieroglyphics with emojis.
Ryan: That's true. That is true.
Coley: We we've gone way back. We're like
Sarah Gonzalez: Figure it out. What do you think I'm trying to say with those emojis?
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: Right. do you still remember any 'cause we had to remember a bunch of phone numbers for our like, you know, friends. Do you still do you have any that that are still on
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah.
Ryan: the top of your memory?
Sarah Gonzalez: God, I haven't thought about that. Like the o I only know one person's phone number and it's my older sister's.
Ryan: Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: And cause like she got a cell phone first. And so then I remember memorizing her number and using it for a long time. And whenever it'd be like, what's your emergency? Or like if you have emergency contact, I would always like always put her. and so now to today I only know hers, my mom's and my husband's. I don't know anyone else's phone numbers.
Ryan: Yeah. I feel like I still remember like four or five it's that are just etched etched
Sarah Gonzalez: That's nice. So, okay,
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: so I did an episode for Planet Money for my the podcast that I work out once. so just like to give you a little sense of my nineties nostalgia, which is real actually.
Ryan: Yeah, yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: which was about how nineties to me were like the golden age of commercials. Like I was like,
Ryan: yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: like maybe she's born with
Coley: Hundred percent.
Sarah Gonzalez: it. Maybe it's Maybelline. Like Mentos the Fresh Maker. Like the best part of Waking up. Like folders in your cup. Like all those. Like I was like, where did the jingle go? Like we used to have like we we knew all these jingles, but the reason I bring this up is because I was like talking to my little sister about it and she was like, I still remember the phone numbers from like the commercials. Like like like the carpet cleaning commercial and like the Bale Bondsman commercials. Like she's like, I can like we can like sing you those phone numbers and I'm
Coley: Mm-hmm.
Sarah Gonzalez: like, that's and it's because like the jingles just had like staying power. So no, I don't remember the people in my lives phone numbers, but I do remember commercials because I don't know, like when was the last time you guys heard a jingle in a commercial? I feel like it's been
Ryan: I love jingles.
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah.
Ryan: I wanna write jingles right now and and and we
Coley: Right.
Ryan: should do like a we should do like a something with the podcast, Coley, where on social media we just do clips of of nineties commercials and like have people like guess like what they are, you know?
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: 'cause like you're saying, the best part of waking up is folders in your and then there was like the got milk, there was like the Budweiser, what's up, what's up?
Coley: God.
Ryan: And the frogs, but eyes, bud er. Mentos, the freshmaker?
Sarah Gonzalez: All this. Yeah. Mm-hmm.
Ryan: That was a good one too.
Sarah Gonzalez: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Ryan: yeah, you're
Coley: But I I think with with so much fast forwarding in today's in today's world, the the commercial is is losing its you like you have to get somebody's attention in like two three
Ryan: Yeah.
Coley: seconds. They're no longer these thirty second commercials. So
Sarah Gonzalez: Well, that's so when I did that episode, I was like asking like a marketing expert. And I was like, Is it me? Like, am I just like that old lady now that's like back in my day the commercials were amazing. Like
Ryan: huh.
Sarah Gonzalez: and I was like, or was there like actually something better about them? And she was like, Well, I think it's both. I think it's like part of your nostalgia, like it's part of your childhood. And so you have this like these like fond feelings about it because it's was my lived experience. But she was like, But also the nineties because of where the nineties sat like technologically, it was for a lot of people like those commercials just don't exist anymore. But the nineties were also the last time really when we all would like collectively watch the same commercials.
Ryan: That's true.
Sarah Gonzalez: Like we would like sit down and we all knew these jingles and we all because we all would be like, and now we're waiting for like Saved by the Bell to come back on and we watch that commercial
Ryan: Mm-hmm.
Sarah Gonzalez: and we all knew them. And now it's like our algorithms give us different ads, and we'd like I might see a commercial that you will never ever see.
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: And so
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: like the nineties were the last time that we were all like being mass marketed to. Like now it's like more like niche marketing, like they're gonna market to me on Instagram. these pairs of
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: pants or this litter shirt or
Coley: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: whatever. And like whatever you're getting, I will probably never see and not know.
Ryan: And plus we're getting, you know, we would just see ads on TV and hear it on radio, but now it's in our face twenty four seven with everything. You click on it, it's an ad. It's an ad. It's this. It's that. So you gotta click out of that. So it's just I feel like it's more like you said, targeted, but they're just hitting everyone like twenty X or fifty X constantly than
Sarah Gonzalez: Constantly. Yeah. Yeah.
Coley: It's the algorithm.
Ryan: what it was. Yeah. Nah, but yeah, let's I mean, I think it's interesting, but now if it's all right, I wanted to kinda transition a little bit to the the podcast where you were talking about how companies are kinda sneaking chemicals into our foods and you know, if you're willing to talk about that a bit, I was first off I was wondering what how that popped up on your radar and how that became of interest to you to kind of look into it more.
Sarah Gonzalez: Mm-hmm. So, like a couple years ago, I kind of got on like a consumer protection beat kick. Like what I was gonna focus on as a reporter is like consumer protection-y stuff. And I was like, I think it was like around the time that I had my first kid, and I was like, I don't want like certain chemicals and around my household. Like I want clothes or
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: like laundry detergent that's like not
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: gonna poison this like little baby who's like slobbering all over my clothes or whatever. and then I started just like paying more attention for my own personal reasons. and then started becoming interested. Like I feel like at our show, Planet Money, we're a lot of hosts and we all sort of have different interests, and we all kind of like follow our own natural curiosities and do whatever stories like appeal to us. And so, like
Ryan: Sure.
Sarah Gonzalez: often whatever I become interested in as a person or consumer or whatever, I end being like. Hmm, like what's the story? I like I used to start being like, there's like a story here, and I can like talk about this stuff. and so I just started doing like interviews about like certain additives. Like I was like at one point I was like, maybe I'm gonna do like a profile of an additive, like one additive,
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: like what was like the lobbying that went into that went into like getting this one additive to be allowed into our food? Like Who's who's like the interested parties and like who do they fight for and how does like that work? and then I was like, I don't want to like single out like any one additive. And
Coley: Mm-hmm.
Sarah Gonzalez: then like really the problem is like all of the additives. And so the the title of that episode was like how sneaky chemicals, how food companies are allowed to sneak chemicals into our food or something like that. But chemicals is just like a word for. You can also call it additives
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: or ingredients. It's just like new things that have been invented in a lab. They're like brand
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: new ingredients or additives or chemicals or whatever you want to call it. And you're like, we've invented
Coley: Ha ha ha.
Sarah Gonzalez: this new thing in a lab. And now we're gonna put it into our food and and say that it does this thing. And so it was it the show that episode is about like everything that would fall under that umbrella term of like an additive or an ingredient or a chemical. and some feel more chemically than others, right? Cause like
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: everything is technically considered an additive, like a banana is considered an additive if it's added to food. but
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: what we focused on was like new additives that had never been used in food before. And how like if you've just created a brand new chemical, if you're like a chemical maker or a food maker and you've just invented a brand new ingredient, how does that get into the food supply? What's the role of the Food and Drug Administration which exists to protect consumers against harmful food and drugs? like
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: what's their role? And it's like, turns out, kind of chill. But it's like it's like there's a lot of it's a it's a lot of like the honor system.
Ryan: interesting. Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: Which I can talk I can talk more about if you if you'd like.
Ryan: Yeah, well I was gonna we can kind of circle on that. I was like I I see this phrase that grass loophole, right? and I was I was just curious like what year that came in, how it how it came about, like you know, what it means, you know, maybe are a lot of cause I've asked people about this, like as I've dug into this more, nobody knows about it at all.
Sarah Gonzalez: Well, okay, so in some circles people know a lot about it, right? But I think general
Ryan: Sure, sure.
Sarah Gonzalez: general public maybe not. But okay, so the FDA created this big or like there was this Congress passed this big food additives law in nineteen fifty-eight, I believe. And so technically
Ryan: Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: in nineteen fifty-eight, we said, like, if you're a food company and you're gonna introduce a brand new ingredient that's never been used in food before, the FDA, you have to sh prove to them that your new additive or ingredient or chemical is safe. And The FDA is gonna sign off on it. But it was taking the FDA like a really long time to sign off on these kinds of things, so to speak. It was taking a long time for them to review every new ingredient. And over time, people, companies, and the FDA started sort of being like, we think that built into this law is an exception for things that are generally recognized as safe, G R A S or GRASS. And so they were like, if things are generally recognized as safe, the FDA shouldn't have to be like bogged down for years to review like flour or vinegar or sugar. And so some people in this, like experts in this industry, will say like generally recognized as safe food ingredients were supposed to be for like sugar, a banana, flour. Like you don't have to review that. but the language was kind of like loosey-goosey, and so it could have been interpreted to be like whatever you want it to be, kind of. And so over the years, it got interpreted to mean that like you as a food maker or food company, you can say like, this new ingredient is generally recognized as safe according to our in-house scientists. which like there's some conflict potential conflict of interest there if your scientists that you pay are the ones that say it is safe. And The FDA doesn't have to look at that to confirm anything because we're just like trusting you and your in-house scientists, right? Probably most of the time it's fine and they're they're doing the right studies and whatever, but
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: sometimes they're not. And things slip through the cracks. And our episode focuses on a woman who is one of 42 women who had to have their gallbladders removed after they consumed a brand new chemical that had never been used in food before and turned out to not be really safe for some humans. And so
Ryan: wow. Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: and and the the way that it happened was that company was like it's generally recognized as safe. So therefore the FDA doesn't have to review it. So that is the grass loophole. It's like if we self-certify that our brand new ingredient is safe, the FDA doesn't have to look at it. But what's more interesting, I think to me, is that this is how the process can work. You can say, like, I have a brand new ingredient, I'm certifying that it's generally recognized as safe for humans to eat. but I want to be a good party. I want the FDA to know about it so you can notify the FDA. Just FYI, this new grass ingredient is gonna be in like a smoothie or a granola or whatever. And the FDA can look at that and go, like, I don't know, this chemical actually looks similar to this other chemical that we know got causes cancer. Like, does yours also cause cancer? Or like, how much of this chemical or ingredient are you using? Because it depends on like how much it might be problematic. And then you, the food company, can be like, that's too many questions. We were just, we were just trying to be nice and share this with you. You're now asking way too many questions. We are going to retract our notice, pretend like you did not hear about our chemical, and then you just use it in food anyway. And so people actually call that the secret grass loophole. Because grass means I tell the FDA that it's safe and I use it if I want to. Secret grass is you don't tell the FDA anything. You just put your brand new ingredient in food without telling the FDA ever, and they have no idea. and 99% of the chemicals that are in our food right now were added through the grass loophole, either the grass or secret grass loophole. So, what was like it's like there's been like in the past recent 24 years, there's been like 900 new brand new chemicals introduced to food. And only 10 of them went through the FDA review process. The rest were like, we're just gonna say that they're safe. but like you don't normally hear from a bunch of people getting super sick from food, right? Like it's not like at one point in the interviewing process, I was like, listen, I'm 38 years old. I've been eating food my whole entire life. And like, I haven't been poisoned. Like my gallbladder's in there, like nothing has happened.
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: And this lawyer who fo who focuses on food regulation, she was like, I think people are getting sick all the time from the food. It's just that they're not getting immediately sick, like they did in the case of the gallbladder.
Ryan: That's what I was thinking. Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: But she was like, it's really hard to trace back the effect of some of these chemicals on our bodies over the long term. Like in in some cases, when you eat a thing and you get sick immediately, that's like The easiest case and in some ways
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: like best case scenario, because you can identify it immediately and pull it off the shelves, right? If there's no immediate effect, it's like a little more tricky, a little more complicated. and so her she said something that was really great that didn't make it into the episode, but she was like, When I was first starting studying law, I took like a consumer protection law class, and the professor was like, Americans can buy whatever stupid thing they want. Like they're entitled to buy whatever stupid thing they want, but like they should know. what it is and decide if they still wanna buy it, right? Like and I was like, hmm, that seems like, you know, like like more like consumers her thing was like consumers should at least know what the potential consequences might be.
Ryan: Right. And did you get into any like of like how in certain communities maybe some people aren't don't have the education or the understanding, you know, of chemicals or whatever, and then they're just
Sarah Gonzalez: I think nobody has a good understanding of what's in our food. Like it's so hard. Like, even if you're tr like,
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: I remember me trying to be like a better consumer than I have been in the past when I became a mom. And I was like, it's really hard to find like to know if you're doing and it you'll it's just it you'll overwhelm yourself trying to figure out if any if what you put in your body is like good for you. You know, I mean like I try to be like Vegetables, fruit, like not a ton of prepackaged foods. Yeah, like
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: Whole Foods? Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: that's your best bet. I would think th that that's what people say.
Ryan: But there are, you know, obviously a lot of people that just can't, you know, whole foods and organic things cost a lot of money, right? So there are a lot of people that just might only be able to shop at a convenience store, right? And then look at all the chemicals that you know, in a Twix bar or Skittles or whatever. But yeah, I get it. It's
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah. I mean, what's in our food and then access and affordability of food are like two totally different things. and we've done episodes on like food deserts and things
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: on like people who rely on like dollar stores to to for their food, which like honestly the dollar store is my favorite store in the whole entire world. Like I've always been like a dollar tree girl.
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: There's one right by me that I like. Yeah. I like it too. I like it. Same.
Sarah Gonzalez: but like not for like necessarily I don't I have been I have not had to rely on it exclusively for like my groceries, right? It's more like it's like fun like to be like, I got ten bucks, what am I gonna buy at Dollar Tree, you know?
Ryan: Yeah.
Coley: Yeah.
Ryan: Yeah. Do you know if there are any like any studies out there that are that are kind of tracking some of these, you know, over time some of these chemicals and like maybe certain subsets of people that are getting various diseases or whatever? Is there anything like that that you're able to
Sarah Gonzalez: There's so many. The way that that I have so we did a part, kind of like a part two to the food episode, which is about supplements. So just to
Ryan: Uh-huh. Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: like close the loop on the grass loophole, food is considered so much more unregulated than like supplements, like protein powder is creatine, melatonin, like all that kind of stuff.
Coley: Interesting.
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: That if you are a chemical maker or whatever and you've just invented a new supplement or you've just created a new extract and you're gonna have like green tea extract or whatever it might be for a supplement, and you try to get it approved through by the FDA or whatever, like the one like the conventional wisdom is that it is so hard to get a new ingredient approved for use in a supplement that
Ryan: Mm-hmm.
Sarah Gonzalez: lawyers will tell supplement companies. Put that new ingredient in a food product first, because food is easy. You can just self-certify that it's generally recognized as safe. So, like if you have a supplement, put it in like a granola bar or a smoothie. And now it's a food product, not a supplement, but it's still that same brand new ingredient that has never been like vetted by a third party or by the FDA at least. and so they will put it in a food product first. Now it's on the market. Now it's like considered having been on the market. And so Now it's not a new dietary ingredient, and you can just put it in a supplement without having to go through the FDA process. And so on the studies point, there are a lot of studies where people are trying to link certain negative health effects on the human body for like certain link certain supplements. But a lot of these things are like mixed. Like one supplement will
Ryan: Mm.
Sarah Gonzalez: be like it has some of this and some of this and some of that and some of that. And then you're like, How it's like very hard for scientists to like isolate. It's this one part of the supplement that is causing the problem. And I imagine the same is true for food. Like in processed foods, there's just so many things in there. Like, how do you even isolate the thing? And like who is even gonna be held responsible 20, 30, 40 years from now when you're getting sick after repeat exposures over your whole life? Like the
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: People in charge of that company are probably be long gone or like not in charge
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: anymore. Like it's just like,
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: and who's gonna fund these studies? Like who is the person that's gonna be like, I'm gonna study the effect on of this chemical on the human body over fifty years to see if it causes cancer? Like who is gonna do that? Who's gonna fund that study?
Ryan: Right. But I feel like I notice we have like certain dyes in foods and certain things that are just absolutely horrible where it's just like, why is this even you know, and now and now companies are starting to put like on like I've seen it on on Doritos bags recently. They're like all natural, you know? That's like before it's like nothing you know, it's like how how
Sarah Gonzalez: yeah. Right. Like it's like yeah. It's like the cheat the like chips that don't have any of the like red spr orange sprinklings or whatever. Okay, you wanna hear a really depressing story that is
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: not in my well not depressing, but like kind of. it wasn't in the episode. I don't wanna get it wrong. I think it was Fruit Loops. Okay, so there was a time
Ryan: don't don't crush my don't crush my my fruit now I'm kidding.
Sarah Gonzalez: Hold on, what
Coley: You're
Sarah Gonzalez: was it?
Coley: gonna ruin Frulloops for Ryan forever.
Ryan: Ha ha ha.
Sarah Gonzalez: I think it was, hold on, let me check my notes very quickly.
Ryan: That was all the all the all the cereals we grew up with as kids, but Apple Jacks, Cookie Crisp.
Sarah Gonzalez: I know, I know. I wonder if they were wonder if people were if they you always used those also. I think it was Fruit Loops, but let me not hold on, hold on, hold on. Yeah, it was Fruit Loops. Okay.
Ryan: Mm.
Sarah Gonzalez: wait, was it? Of course I don't
Ryan: Lucky Charms?
Sarah Gonzalez: have my notes like readily accessible right now.
Ryan: you're fine.
Sarah Gonzalez: okay, but here's the story. So there was like a time when
Ryan: Mm-hmm.
Sarah Gonzalez: people were starting to revolt against against like food colorings. Like they like, we want it to be more all natural. We want it to be like whatever, whatever, whatever. and so Kellogg or General Mills? No,
Ryan: Mm.
Sarah Gonzalez: I can't tell you the story without actually knowing the details. So give me one second, because then we can't
Ryan: take your time, yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: just name the wrong company. Okay.
Ryan: I want to hear this for sure.
Sarah Gonzalez: Well now I've set it up so Yeah. Yeah. It was Fruit Loops and it's Kellogg.
Ryan: Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: No, that's them they're removing it again now. my gosh, maybe I shouldn't tell you the story 'cause I can't. Okay. Give me one more second. Is this bad? Are you gonna edit all this out? Or is everyone just waiting for me to give you the find my notes?
Ryan: Sure. No, no, no. We're I'm I'm I can't wait. I'm still I'm very excited.
Coley: Ha ha.
Sarah Gonzalez: Your your Okay, I'm just gonna have to do it without the full details, but there's a colorful cereal company. Okay.
Ryan: Mm.
Sarah Gonzalez: Use your imagination. there's okay, so there was a time when American consumers started like really revolting against artificial dyes, and we were like, we don't want them in our food, we don't want them in our food. And then like the cereal company is like, I'm gonna give the people what they want and we're gonna like remove artificial dyes. We're only gonna use like natural food coloring. So like
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: Turmeric to make it yellow and whatever. and consumers hated it, weren't buying the cereal anymore. They were like, this is dull, it's lifeless, my childhood is ruined. It's like the colors are all muted. It was like lavender and beige and light orange, not like blu bright blue and bright green and bright red. And like dyes don't contribute to taste. It's literally just the look.
Ryan: yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: And they're like this
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: c you know, the the brand is like trying to meet consumer preferences. And then the people are like, no, no, no, bring the artificial dyes back. We don't like how it looks. I was like, what a telling anecdote, because sometimes you're like, you wanna kind of, I think some people it's like, let's blame the companies or whatever,
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: but like they're also giving people what we are willing to accept and pay for, you know, like and sometimes. Consumers will say they want a thing and then when they're given that thing, they s literally stop buying it as much and they want
Ryan: That's true.
Sarah Gonzalez: the bad thing again. Or, you know, not to say that dyes are bad, but the thing that they had thought they didn't want.
Ryan: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: so it's like it's hard it's hard to like I like what do you I I mean, I think advocates will say, like, at the very least, we should consumers should be able to know. what the potential effects of certain food products are. And then if
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: they wanna still buy them, they can buy them. But like let us know
Coley: Yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: is I think what some people believe.
Ryan: Got it. Got it. And one more question. I know we've taken up too much of your time here and you've been super gracious. So this episode suggests kind of the system relies heavily on companies kind of policing themselves. what economic incentives make that system attract attractive to regulators in industry, do you think?
Sarah Gonzalez: Like why do they choose to do it their own way, then through the long FDA
Ryan: Yeah, yeah.
Sarah Gonzalez: re review process? So okay, I mean, if you don't have to notify the FDA. And wait a year, two years, back in the day, three years, like what what is the incentive to notify them? And also, like, if you if it turns out that you your food ingredient caused some kind of real damage, besides getting sued by like a private attorney, the FDA doesn't go like you don't get to be a food company now, you like didn't do your diligent like, you know, you didn't like look at things properly, and so now we're gonna like fine you or not let you sell food anymore. Like, there's not a whole lot of consequence. And so what is the incentive to wait potentially years to get the FDA to review something? You know? On on the flip side though, like You could argue, people argue that regulation, more regulation, more review would slow down innovation, right? We have so many options, so many food options. Like our aisles, our grocery store aisles are filled with so many, so many options.
Ryan: Too much.
Sarah Gonzalez: Because regulations are not getting in the way. And so, like, what are the trade-offs? Do you want to have a world where you have like three serial options or whatever, 20 serial options, or like 200 serial options? you know, like I think some people want like innovation can happen sometimes because there's not a ton of regulation getting in the way. Right? And so like and if you go back to like the origins, 'cause I was like, when did additives like become a thing? When are we when did like we really start putting them into food? And do you wanna guess? Does anybody do you guys know when like additives became a thing?
Ryan: I'm gonna guess in like the
Coley: Mm nineteen fifty something?
Ryan: sev sixties.
Sarah Gonzalez: After around World War II. So it was like
Ryan: Okay.
Sarah Gonzalez: all a lot of the men are leaving to go to war. Women
Ryan: Mm-hmm.
Sarah Gonzalez: are no longer, they're now entering the workforce. They don't have that much time to stay at home and cook things from scratch. And so the market
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: identifies this need for shelf-stable food. And that's when we see like a ton of innovation in the like food chemical space. That's when we start getting shelf-stable foods with like preservatives and and stuff in them. And it's like, It was meant to fill a real need. Like we needed shelf stable food during the war to send to the troops, right? And so it's like
Ryan: Right.
Sarah Gonzalez: like there's a time and a place, I guess. and like not a ton of regulation standing in the way is kind of what got us to like ramp up our food or you know, add all these new food products to shelves around World War Two.
Ryan: I mean it's super interesting and you know, first off, well, we appreciate your your time like coming in. It was it was so nice to to hear about life in the nineties and you know, you guys have such a an influential show with Planet Money and you know, I can't even imagine what it's like to to be one of the the co hosts on that. So just wanna say you're doing an awesome job and
Sarah Gonzalez: No, thanks.
Ryan: you know, it's super nice to to to kinda to get to know you a bit and thanks thanks again for coming on.
Sarah Gonzalez: Yeah, thanks so much for having me in Talking Nineties and Food Safety.
Ryan: Yeah, for sure. And you know, we got that Greensboro connection too, so I'm gonna go kinda look into if any of my high that's what I've done.
Sarah Gonzalez: Maybe I'll see you. Maybe I'll see you at cookout one day.
Coley: my gosh.
Ryan: don't even get me started on cookout, man. I wish they had a
Sarah Gonzalez: Don't even get me started on cookout. They're watermelon milkshake.
Ryan: yeah. I mean in in the in the actual like cost of it all is like nothing compared to something in California or Colorado. Like you can get a whole meal.
Sarah Gonzalez: I feel like everything is expensive everywhere now. Like everything
Ryan: It it
Sarah Gonzalez: is expensive everywhere.
Ryan: Yeah, it is it's going up too quick, but that won't stop us from joining our cookout from time to time. So Well, we'll let you get
Sarah Gonzalez: See you there at midnight w as when cookout should be consumed.
Ryan: Exactly. Exactly. Well again, thank you. you know, this was this was Sarah Gonzalez from from Planet Money. And you can find us offline days, offline D A Z E Facebook, TikTok, Instagram. And we're signing off after this wonder wonderful interview and hope you have a a great rest of your day, Sarah.
Sarah Gonzalez: Thanks you guys too. Bye.
Ryan: All right, bye.
Coley: Yes.
