That's One Small Step for Nutella, One Giant Leap for Mankind

Apr. 13, 2026

On February 20, 1962, John Glenn set off for space aboard the Friendship 7 atop an Atlas rocket. No one expected him to actually pilot the craft. They only expected him to go up, orbit, and return alive. Despite being a decorated test pilot, his mission was to be pure biological cargo. Human cargo, of course. But the Project Mercury pilots and those responsible for selling NASA's missions didn't want flesh-and-blood mannequins in space, they wanted heroes, and heroes had to navigate. That is why the Friendship 7 featured controls and windows, and why the pilots had a story to tell. Or to sell, rather.

Project Mercury was the predecessor to the Apollo Program. This initial project laid the technical and human foundations for putting a man on the Moon and also wrote the manual for selling every mission as a triumph of American capitalism in its quest to push humanity toward the next frontier. From that moment on, NASA devoted a large portion of its budget and time to constructing the narrative of its new heroes. It turned its astronauts into superhuman beings capable of achieving the impossible.

Six decades later, NASA has sent one woman and six men to orbit the Moon, further than any human has ever gone before. This time, the selected astronauts are an example of diversity and humanity. NASA has told us their stories, their human side, and their tragedies, but always through the mystique that surrounds astronauts. Human, yes, but not quite like us.

And amidst all this grandeur, this epic scope, this historical moment recounted in a million posts, a jar of Nutella floats across the cabin due to the zero gravity.

It is exactly at that moment when everything shifts.

As Carles Gomez, Creative Director of Fuego Camina Conmigo, puts it:

"We spent decades turning astronauts into heroes to make space feel unreachable. And then a floating jar of Nutella did the opposite. It made space feel human."

 

Because, 406,771 km from Earth, the four heroes of Artemis are no longer distant figures. They are doing something deeply familiar. Something ordinary. Indulging in a treat.

The myth breaks quietly. No speeches, no epic framing. Just a small, almost ridiculous moment that collapses the distance between “them” and “us”.

The fact that the Nutella flight has become a meme may be a sign that we no longer want heroes. That we no longer want to hear the same story over and over again. That, for a brief moment, we felt capable of being in space ourselves one day.

The people at Nutella may be celebrating this moment, but it seems to me that NASA has much more to celebrate.