CAN THE LOWLY CATFISH GO UPSCALE?

Had to happen sooner or later: the Dallas image-makers have gotten around to hustling catfish, as if this tasly piscine pal needed anyone to help it fish for compliments.

The Richards Group is tackling the account, and they’re out to solve two problems: first, the fish we see as a dynamite dinner in the South is just another ugly scavenger in the North, held in the same low esteem Yankees reserve for grits and chili without beans. Says Richards Group account exec Hal Curtis: “They think of it as something you’d pull out of the Potomac and not feed to your children or yourself.” Curtis holds slim hope that Northerners will take the bait. Instead, his target area is the South, where 85 percent of the nation’s catfish can expect to be eaten. Strangely, the catfish has fallen into some disrepute even in Dixie. “Most people in the South think it’s a fried food, and thus perceive it as a product that’s not very nutritious,” Curtis says.

To alter these perceptions, catfish pushers will run full-page ads in Time, Reader’s Digest, and other major magazines, accompanied by creative nouveau recipes for non-fried catfish cuisine. Catfish kabobs? Catfish ’N’ Curry? How’re we gonna keep ’em down on the (catfish) farm after they’ve seen puree?