Drive north on I-83 from downtown, and right where you need to pump the brakes as the expressway swerves sharp to the left, you can’t miss it: the new “eat more bagels” billboard from THB Bagelry & Deli.

Featuring an anthropomorphic blue crab with a black marker and a container of Old Bay Seasoning, the message is meant to promote the eatery’s asiago Old Bay bagels.

It’s also a nod to Chick-fil-A’s bovine “Eat Mor Chikin” campaign, which features spellcheck-deprived cows holding signs with that slogan.

We don’t need to spell this out for you, do we? The cow is saying to eat more chicken, presumably to save her cow friends from slaughter, while the crab is saying to eat more bagels in order to prevent him and his fellow crustaceans from being steamed and doused in Old Bay.

“Old Bay is Maryland’s favorite seasoning,” said Charissa Costa, director of marketing for the bagel business also known as Towson Hot Bagels, which has seven locations in and around Baltimore. THB also just purchased a new building that will become its central commissary kitchen as it prepares to expand.

The special bagels are only available in the summer months. Miss them, and you’ll have to wait a few months to score Old Bay at THB: Each December, the bagel chain rolls out its Old Bay hot chocolate.

The ads are just the latest in a long legacy of Baltimore billboards with crabs talking. Who can forget PETA’s 2018 “I’m ME, not MEAT” campaign, or the ensuing clapback from Jimmy’s Famous Seafood?

The THB campaign doesn’t exactly have Chick-fil-A’s blessing. Costa said the bagelry searched online and found that there were many registered trademarks with “eat more” in them. Eat more beans. Eat more beer. Plus, THB doesn’t sell fried chicken. “It was pretty fair to say we are not a direct competitor,” she said. The new slogan is a “hat tip” to the fried chicken chain. “We thought it was a funny play on words.”

Baltimore trademark attorney Charles L. Riddle compared Chick-fil-A’s “eat more” catchphrase to the old “Got milk?” campaign, which spawned countless imitations, as well as McDonald’s old “I’m lovin’ it” slogan.

While a company like Chick-fil-A could argue that the “eat more” phrase is a clear reference to their business, the long list of other “eat more” trademarks means Chick-fil-A would have a hard time arguing that it’s theirs and theirs only, Riddle said.

But they’ve tried to fight it in the past. According to a 2011 article in the Christian Science Monitor, an attorney for Chick-fil-A wrote that the company had successfully protested 30 different attempts to trademark versions of the phrase.

Notably, THB hasn’t yet applied to trademark “eat more bagels.”

Other big names have co-opted the “eat more” catchphrase, including Shake Shack. This year, the burger chain rolled out their “Eat More Antibiotic-Free Chicken” campaign to promote their chicken sandwiches. It was an apparent jab at Chick-fil-A after the chicken chain reversed course on its antibiotic-free chicken policies. (Shake Shack also held a Sunday-only chicken sandwich giveaway; Chick-fil-A is famously closed on Sundays.)

Somewhere along the line, Chick-fil-A seems to have mostly stopped using the “eat more chikin” slogan in their promotional materials in favor of something duller: “Chicken. Joy. Delivered.” A spokesman for the company did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In the meantime, THB owner Tony Scotto recommends trying the asiago Old Bay bagels with tuna salad. Or try Costa’s suggestion: “A breakfast sandwich is pretty epic with this bagel.”