What You Didn't Know About The Market Monsters On Supermarket Sweep

"Supermarket Sweep" is a beloved American TV game show, which first aired all the way back in 1965. The game combines elements of a quiz show with a race through the aisles of a supermarket, with contestants competing against each other to grab grocery store items of the highest total value, via Popsugar. Although the original show only ran for two years, "Supermarket Sweep" was revamped for a new audience in 1990 and aired for over a decade, coming to an end in 2003, until it was revived yet again by ABC in 2020, per DoYou Remember. 

The new version, hosted by Leslie Jones, follows much the same format and rules as the original, and many fans of the 90s format are excited to see the fun game show return to their screens. The new "Supermarket Sweep" certainly brings back plenty of nostalgia for viewers that remember the earlier run of the show. However, there is one part of the series that did not make a comeback, and for good reason. Even diehard fans of the show may not remember that "Supermarket Sweep" used to have a short lived and somewhat strange element — the "market monsters."

The market monsters, otherwise known as "weird customers," were pretty much exactly what they sound like — people would dress up in monster costumes and roam the aisles, scaring shoppers as they went around the store trying to find the items they needed during the "Big Sweep" segment of the show. Contestants who were unlucky enough to encounter the monsters were forced to turn and flee in the other direction, per the Supermarket Sweep Fandom. These market monsters included a spooky centurion turkey inexplicably named Big Dave, a strange and menacing character called Mr. Yuk, and even a Frankenstein's Monster, according to Game Show Garbage.

As it turned out, the market monsters were not particularly popular — perhaps because they seemed so out of place in an otherwise normal, not-haunted supermarket — and so they were phased out after just four months, according to the Supermarket Sweep Fandom. By the late 90s, the market monsters were officially gone, and the show ran for another few years with nary a monster in sight. They have yet to make an appearance in the new revival, to the great relief of both contestants and viewers alike, and it seems like a safe bet to say they probably never will.