In April, Kraft launched their new Cheddar Explosion Macaroni & Cheese. With all the ear splitting, kinetic imagery, the package looks like an ad for dynamite, geared to Wile E. Coyote...

...and to promote the product, Kraft sponsored the demolition of Texas Stadium. While that seems like a gonzo, one-off stunt, that marketing ploy is actually the natural conclusion of a branding trend that's been 100 years in the making--For a century, food brands have toyed with images of explosions, hoping to (figuratively) explode off the shelf. It was only a matter of time until the explosion blasted off the package.

So how that branding trend begin, and how did it develop?

"People spend an average of three seconds deciding what to select, and it’s not words that have the most impact but color followed by shape,” says graphic designer (and Fast Company expert blogger) Debbie Millman. Blasts and shocks are especially common on products geared toward kids, and the cereal aisle in particular is a minefield. "We’re genetically programmed to be attracted to disturbances of the norm,” says Thomas Hine, a design historian and author of The Total Package. “Just look at movies and television—we love explosions.”

“Vim, vigor and vitality” burst out of the bottle in this Dr. Pepper ad from 1907. Food packaging in the early 20th century was often more conservative than the associated advertising...

...because once brought home, packages were intended to fit into their surroundings of the kitchen and the pantry, so they couldn’t be too flashy. But the advertising that encouraged the purchase was another story--that's where the pyrotechnics were concentrated.

A 1929 ad for Campbell’s Tomato Soup features the recognizable but relatively sedate soup can in a vibrant scene, where a ripe tomato eclipses the sun and appears to radiate beams of light. “This kind of imagery creates excitement about what’s inside—it’s about the power of taste and the power of nourishment,” says Hine.

Advertising drew inspiration from contemporary culture and evolved alongside adventure comics and later video games. In a 1920s advertisement for Crush orange drink, blue and orange stripes emanate from the bottle, evoking the dynamic graphics and bold colors of early 20th century Expressionist art.

Hine describes these styles, packed with graphics of radiation and explosions as “highly communicative, punching out into the viewer’s space.” Eventually, this super-charged imagery would move on to the package itself.

Evoking a “KA-POW” graphic from a comic book, a device called a “violator” became common in the mid-20th century. A mini-explosion right on the package, the violator is the visual equivalent of an alarm bell. Often a starburst or jagged-edge shape, it demands attention by cutting across the existing design with an urgent announcement. “Instant!” was a common declaration on food packaging in the 1950s, when the machine age made convenience into a key selling point.

Could the art of Bernini and the packaging design of Barteldes TNT Popcorn have something in common? Hine points out that Baroque architecture and design employed starbursts and explosive motifs, notably for the monstrance, a container for the sacrament that sits on church altars. The design was meant to evoke another world, bursting into our own.

Michael Bast, a food illustrator who has designed packages for companies like Procter & Gamble, Kraft, and Celestial Seasonings, calls the current style “kinetic overstatement.” Discussing his concept drawing for a can of Screamin’ Dill Pickle Pringles potato chips, Bast highlights the importance of dramatic lighting, sharp focus, and forced perspective. “Sometimes clients don’t like negative space, but to have the most impact, you really need to see the source of the explosion,” says Bast, noting that the spear-like pickle lent itself well to the composition.

Bast is hoping for a move away from the extreme kinetic trend. “Now that we can do anything in Photoshop, things have gotten too busy.”

But when the target market is kids, advertisers are relying more and more on explosive imagery. “Kids are seeing violence and explosions in video games, and the packaging geared toward them is operating with the same visual language,” says Millman, who is president of the design group of Sterling Brands, “In fact, they’re probably eating this food while watching video games.” Here, a spoof brand created by Ad Mongo, developed to teach kids about the marketing blitz they're subjected to.