Realizing that it needed to grab consumers’ attention, General Motors embarked on one of the automotive industry’s most bold advertising slogans, “This is not your father’s Oldsmobile,” during the late-80s to mid-90s. Although the company and car ultimately didn’t deliver, the ad slogan still reverberates with its intriguing challenge.
It’s also an apt way to describe a new generation of R&D and culinary centers. Today’s new facilities appear nothing like their drab predecessors—those sterile, white-wall and stainless-steel labs and kitchen, often hidden in corporate headquarters or factories.