Conagra Brands has reclaimed the Guinness World Record for the longest meat snack stick, unveiling a Slim Jim measuring 429 feet 5.4 inches at its Omaha campus on September 9 — more than 143 yards, or well past the length of a football field.
According to UPI, the record-breaking snack was 116 feet longer than the previous record holder, also a Conagra Slim Jim, which measured 313 feet 5.4 inches. A Guinness World Records adjudicator was on hand to certify the new mark, which the company's internal "Blaze Crew" team spent months developing through trial and error, working through the traditional curing and smoking process at a larger-than-usual scale.
Same recipe, much bigger stick
The Shelby Report and trade outlet Snack Food & Wholesale Bakery reported that the team was determined to keep the oversized snack's flavor identical to a standard Slim Jim despite the scaled-up production. The finished product, weighing close to 70 pounds, was coiled on a rolling wire rack before being unspooled across a row of tables in the company's parking lot for measurement.
The record-breaking Slim Jim is a testament to the creativity, expertise and dedication of our team.
Jess Sweley, SVP of Research & Development, Conagra Brands
Conagra has chased the record before: its previous 313-foot version already held the Guinness title, meaning the company effectively broke its own record by close to 40 percent. The stunt arrives as packaged-snack brands increasingly lean on Guinness attempts and other spectacle marketing to generate social media attention, a tactic that has produced a run of oddball records this year, from a giant hammock hangout to a record-setting cereal-box domino chain.
Conagra has not said whether the jumbo Slim Jim will be put on public display or eventually be cut up and used in promotional giveaways, but the company said the record attempt was designed to spotlight the snack brand ahead of the holiday shopping season.