General Mills

Today I had lunch at the General Mills Headquarters and received a tour of the General Mills Archive. My friend Susan has a totally cool job as an archivist in the Archives. The Archives have rooms and rooms of cereal boxes (going back to the 1930s), cookbooks, advertisements, prizes from inside the cereal boxes, records, recording of old radio commercials, and a ton of of other stuff. Its really amazing.

Security on the other hand is a bit fanatical. Camera and security are everywhere. Oh and did I mention their NO photo rule. Yes, NO PHOTOS inside the complex. How crazy is that! Its like a little city and I was denied photographs. Grrr. On the way too the cafeteria, which was excellent and has a ton of choices (including a yummy popcorn salad), there is a beauty shop, a gift/logo shop, convenience store, coffee shop, dry cleaners, gym, etc. You can also look though a glass wall and into the official General Mills kitchens which is where they create the new food, but no one is allowed in. They were cooking turkey today.

The gift/logo shop and little convenience store were fun. I ended up getting a Wheaties t-shirt, a Cheerio hanky and a box of Lucky Charms cereal. You cannot leave without buying cereal. I think its a rule.

The really cool thing about the whole headquarters, besides the Archives, is all the art. Its everywhere. Art outside, art inside, art in the cafeteria, art on the walls, and there was even little Cheerio art pieces outside.