Former Taco Bell interns say they have proof they invented Doritos Locos Tacos
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Taco Bell (The Cool Ranch Doritos Locos Taco Supreme.)
Interns everywhere take note: your final project could one day be worth a billion dollars.
Andrea Watt claims that she and a team of three other college students came up with the idea for Doritos Locos Taco during an internship in 1995 while working for Taco Bell's then ad agency, Huffington Post reports.
The popular item, which Taco Bell launched in 2012, has since netted over $1 billion for fast food chain.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Watt told the Huffington Post that the idea for Doritos Locos Taco was submitted during a advertising contest and didn't even win, something she said her and her team found surprising. The winner? A line of Taco bell-themed starters called “Mexitizers.”
Though she is not seeking any money, Watt thinks a little acknowledgment of such a genius food-mash up would be nice.
“I’m sure I signed away that anything I pitched to them was their property anyway,” Watt said. “I would just like someone to recognize that it was a good idea."
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}The team isn’t the first to come out with claims that they invented one of the most famous food mash-ups in history. A federal prison inmate sued Taco Bell claiming the popular taco was his idea. But the case was dismissed.
Taco Bell, in a statement to ABC said: "From interns to inmates, we've had no shortage of people claiming to have thought of the 'idea' of a Doritos flavored taco."
After the internship, Watt says that she talked about her now famous idea to friends and potential employers, and always kept the materials, which included this picture and ad mock-up, from her time at Taco Bell.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Surprisingly, though the former young inventors enjoyed their time at Taco Bell, none of them pursued a career in the food industry.