Is Cracker Barrel CEO Already Gone? Insiders Share Unexpected Changes Making Some Think She May Already Be Out the Door
Cracker Barrel CEO Julie Masino has been the subject of rumors claiming she was fired, but the company denied these reports. The rumors arose following backlash from conservatives over a controversial “woke” rebranding effort involving the restaurant’s logo and interiors, as well as dissatisfaction with recent changes to food preparation. Masino had stopped sending regular video updates to employees amid the controversy, fueling speculation. Despite criticism from Cracker Barrel co-founder Tommy Lowe, who slammed Masino’s leadership and the costly rebrand effort, Masino remains listed as CEO on the company’s website. Additionally, attempts to change how certain menu items like meatloaf and biscuits are prepared sparked employee and customer complaints, leading management to reverse some of these changes. the company is facing challenges in regaining customer trust and stabilizing its operations.
Despite rumors that Cracker Barrel fired CEO Julie Masino, a spokesman for the company denied the allegations.
Masino recently faced backlash from conservatives after Cracker Barrel attempted a “woke” rebrand of its logo and its restaurant interiors.
Those controversies, among others about the restaurant’s food preparation, fueled employee rumors that Masino had been “ousted,” the New York Post reported Sept. 19.
The primary evidence for those rumors, however, seemed thin.
Masino would often send video updates to employees across the company. When she suddenly stopped doing them — amid the rebrand fiasco — the rumors began.
But in a statement to the New York Post, Cracker Barrel said the rumors weren’t true.
The company’s leadership “communicates with team members across the Company through a variety of channels, including in person meetings, videos and s,” a spokesman said.
As of Saturday, the Cracker Barrel corporate website still listed Masino as president and CEO of the company.
But not everyone in the company’s leadership is happy about it.
In a Saturday interview with Fox Business, Cracker Barrel co-founder Tommy Lowe, 93, criticized Masino, who previously served as president of Taco Bell.
“Taco Bell is not Cracker Barrel,” Lowe said. “She knows very little about Cracker Barrel’s operation — the history, the food. The idea she’s come up with… doesn’t fit the customer.
“If she’d go out and sit on the front porch and talk to all the customers that come in there, she’d have a little bit of a different outlook,” he added.
In an Aug. 28 interview, Lowe also skewered Masino about the logo switch-up.
“Food is something they need to work on. Spending $700 million to do that… is throwing money out the street,” Lowe told WTVF-TV in Nashville.
🚨 JUST IN: The founder of Cracker Barrel, 93 year old Tommy Lowe, just SLAMMED the woke rebrand of the restaurant
“It’s crazy… It’s PITIFUL!”
Mr. Lowe also hit the new leftist CEO: “Spending $700 million to do that… they’re just money out into the street!”
God Bless this… pic.twitter.com/eDNvhjL76W
— Nick Sortor (@nicksortor) August 29, 2025
And while the company ultimately decided not to touch the logo or the remaining restaurant interiors, as Lowe mentioned, the food needs some work.
Employees and customers both complained when management ordered a change in how meatloaf and biscuits would be prepared.
Rather than baking the meatloaf fresh each day, management ordered cooks to prepare it the night before and microwave it the next day, the New York Post reported.
“We were told meatloaf will be fresh every day,” a cook told the Post. “Then they said cold portions will be on Monday through Thursday.”
As a cost-cutting measure, management also ordered that biscuits be prepared the day before, frozen, then reheated the next day.
But after customers complained the biscuits were “hard as a rock,” management backpedaled and began making biscuits fresh each day.
“I honestly feel like [management] is floundering to see what they can get away with, what they need to change and what they can keep and not be noticed,” a cook told the New York Post.
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