Cheese from a can. Spaghetti from a spoon. And yogurt on the go. We all
can admit that convenience and junk food go hand
in hand. So let's take a walk down memory lane… or the grocery aisle.
When you think of cheese and crackers, you may imagine a trendy cheese board fit for
an Instagram story. But, in 1953, Cheez Whiz on crackers became the norm for a cheese and cracker
pairing. This saucy cheese in a can grew to be a grab-and-go staple. Kraft promoted Cheez Whiz as,
Two essential items played a role in the growth of Cheez Wiz,
convenience and longer shelf life. In post-World War II America, comfort was key,
and what better way to save time than staying out of the kitchen and eating cheese out of a jar?
Few junk food snacks compare to the timeless favorite, The Twinkie. In 1930,
James Dewar felt inspired to fill cakes with a sugar-cream mixture from bakery
molds for shortcakes sold during Strawberry season. Thus the golden
sponge cake filled with a creamy filling came to be as we know it.
It wasn't until the 1950s when Twinkies' popularity soared as Hostess sponsored
the very popular "Howdy Doody Show." The commercial advertisement emphasized how they
melt in your mouth like cotton candy, so what kid wouldn't want this in their school lunch?
"Hey kids look here. Clarabell has his whole lunchbox just filled with Hostess Twinkies."
Did you know the candy we know today as Peeps originally had wings? That's right,
in 1953, Just Born acquired Rodda Candy Co., which originally made the candy we know today as Peeps.
But in 1955, the brand decided to clip the wings for good, speeding up the process to
meet the uptick in demand for the popular marshmallow candy. Peeps caught on in a big
way and have stood the test of time, still making an appearance every year around every holiday.
The Kentucky Fried Chicken chain restaurant we know and love came from humble beginnings.
Founder Colonel Sanders bought a roadside motel in Corbin, Kentucky,
and started serving his fried chicken out of it in 1930. The restaurant took off for the next couple
of decades until a new freeway junction forced traffic away from the fried chicken restaurant.
But in 1956, Colonel Sanders wisely decided to go into the franchise business,
successfully bringing cheap, fried chicken to the masses.
In the middle of the Great Depression, Little Debbie founder O.D. McKee started
experimenting with oatmeal cookies in the shop he worked in. After altering the recipe,
he took two soft cookies and sandwiched them together with a
creme filling. These creme pies grew in popularity and sold for a nickel each.
The McKee baking company started in the early 1950s, but it wasn't until around a decade
later after the McKee family purchased King's bakery and opened a modern manufacturing plant,
that they pioneered the family pack, creating a deal for 12-count cakes.
Twelve cakes are better and more profitable than one, which brought in a wave of new customers.
Tastes as good as homemade. Chips Ahoy advertised its cookies as such,
propelling them in popularity. In 1963, Nabisco released their famous homemade tasting cookies,
and today they remain the second favorite cookie in the United States behind Oreos.
Nabisco took inspiration for their cookies from the original Toll House
chocolate chip cookie recipe, but it was their promise of tasting homemade with
the production and shelf life from a factory that added to their fame.
Convenience is everything, and that's why Kellogg’s chairman William E. LaMothe
sought to create a delicious toaster-friendly to-go breakfast option. He partnered with Joe
Thompson and created the breakfast hack for toast and jam. And thus, Pop-Tarts were born.
According to the Pop-Tarts website, in 1964, Pop-Tarts released the original
four flavors in Cleveland, Ohio. After the Strawberry, Blueberry, Brown Sugar Cinnamon,
and Apple flavors took off, the brand went nationwide in 1965. Whether born
in the '60s or the 21st century, Pop-Tarts remain a favorite for kids in the morning.
Did you know SpaghettiOs did so well in product testing with moms and kids that Campbell's decided
to bypass any regional test marketing and go straight to national distribution in 1965?
Unlike any product before it, SpaghettiOs marketed itself as
It grew in popularity immediately after launching.
The first SpaghettiOs TV commercial in 1965 also debuted the original slogan.
“It’s the greatest invention since the napkin.”
Not long after Disneyland opened up for business,
Frito Lay snack company opened "Casa de Fritos" inside the park. This Mexican-style restaurant
in Disneyland's Frontierland got tortillas from the local tortilla factory Alex Foods.
The store realized many tortillas ended up in the trash, so in an effort to save
the leftover food, they cut them up and fried them into chips. By 1966,
people everywhere had cheese powder on their fingertips, and Doritos were born.
Hunt's Snack Packs snack grew in popularity with the launch
of its own mascot, a horse cleverly named Snack Pack. Parents loved the
treats because they could last longer than prior launched pudding products.
In the early years of development, the brand advertised to "Open carefully
and not handle the lid or inner can rim" for safety reasons. After this,
Hunt's replaced the horse with Snack Pack Jack, who endorsed the child-safe lid.
Today Pizza Hut has more than 16,000 restaurants and 350,000 employees in more than 100 countries.
This incredible growth started only in 1958 when the brand opened the first Pizza Hut
restaurant in Wichita, Kansas and the brand really hit its stride in the early 1970s.
It was 1971 when Pizza Hut became the number one restaurant chain in
the world in both sales and number of restaurants.
In the 1960s, Pringles struggled and the wild success the brand enjoys today was out
of reach. The brand nearly flopped, but after improving on the recipe,
the chip made a crazy comeback. After reconstructing the recipe,
Pringles became one of the most popular brands of potato chips in the world today.
The chip remains a favorite today and we understand why;
the shape and storage of the chip created a fresh and intact chip every time.
"Get him!"
"Grandpa, what’s going on?"
"Pringles. We’re trapped in a Pringles commercial. They must’ve taken us in our sleep."
In 1974, Pop Rocks made their way to market, and for years after, kids could not get enough
of this unique candy concoction. Ask anyone who grew up in the '70s; they understand the hype.
Pop Rocks' earliest beginnings date back to the 1950s when General Foods chemist
William Mitchell experimented with creating an instant soft drink. This clearly failed
and left the chemist with sweet candy bits that would "pop" inside one's mouth.
Tostitos began finding their way to store shelves
in 1978 and continued to grow in popularity for years after.
Tostitos Traditional and Nacho Cheese Flavors
hit national distribution after successful test marketing in 1979. By the early 1980s,
the flavors went into national distribution with sales numbers that led Frito-Lay to
declare it one of the most successful new products the company had ever launched.
This bite-sized candy grew in popularity after being featured
in the 1982 movie "E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial."
In the legendary scene, Elliott lures E.T. with a trail of Reese's Pieces. M&M was originally
set to be the candy of choice, but Mars Incorporated refused permission to Spielberg.
After the movie's success, Hershey made a deal with production to promote E.T. with $1 million.
As a result, Reese's Pieces sales jumped 65% after the opening of the sci-fi movie.
The first bite might be sour, but this candy is certainly sweet after a couple of chews.
Sour Patch Kids grew in popularity when the brand switched the shape from Martians, capitalizing on
the space craze of the 1970s, to Cabbage Patch Kids to match the doll's fandom in the '80s.
The candy continues to reign supreme today with its popular tagline,
The promotional advertisements show the little kid candy figures committing
small acts of hostility before their demeanor changes and they become sweet.
Teddy Grahams launched in 1988 and sold more than $150 million in the first year.
They hit the ground running and launched three flavors at once: chocolate, cinnamon, and honey.
After its introduction, Teddy Grahams climbed its way up the snack ladder to become the
third most popular cookie on the market. The cute and tasty cookies made record-breaking
sales at introduction, securing the title of most popular cookie release in a quarter of a century.
What's better than a bite-sized pizza bite? We're sure the inventors of Totino's Pizza Rolls thought
something similar when crafting these delicious rolls. Pizza Rolls make for an easy and savory
lunch or dinner, and obviously a perfect snack. While the tiny pizza bites came out in 1968,
the brand grew in popularity after Pillsbury bought the rights in 1985.
Just about everyone loves pizza, so how can you not have a soft spot for Totino's Pizza Rolls?
"What a winner! Mmmmm. The irresistible taste of pizza. In this hot little bite-sized snack."
Skittles first lived across the pond before coming to North America in 1979. It took three years of
importing the candy from Britain before Skittles started being manufactured in the United States.
Compared to all the flavors we know and love today, Skittles only offered grape,
orange, strawberry, lemon, and lime flavors at the time. Although the brand
gained traction in the early '90s, it wasn't until 1994 that the famous slogan "Taste the
Rainbow" made its debut and became one of the longest-running advertising campaigns.
Push Pop made its way to market in 1986 and especially took off in the
1990s. The 1994 Push Pop commercial propelled the candy further into
popularity with an appearance from movie actor Ryan Reynolds.
It was so popular the Triple Power Push Pop variation created a way to lick three flavors
at the same time in one push-up. Nothing can compete with the Blue Raspberry, Watermelon,
and Strawberry trifecta, as it allowed fans to easily eat one at a time or all three together.
What's better than cake for breakfast? How about cookies in your cereal? Oreo did just that with
the debut of the Oreo O's cereal. The cereal debuted in 1998, followed by a decade of success.
A few years later, in 2001, Oreo O's recipe received a makeover to add real cream filling
and made the cereal taste like the classic Oreo cookie. Although seemingly well-received,
the product vanished from most shelves around 2007, though it has come back since then.
If you learn anything from the evolution of American food products, it’s that convenience
is certainly key. Food Scientists at General Mills in the early '90s clearly felt the same
as they set out to prove that yogurt could be put in a tube. After rounds of testing
and recipe altering, Go-GURT as we know it hit shelves in 1998 as part of a regional test.
The product was such a hit in school lunch boxes that according to General Mills,
Time dubbed it "the fastest-selling yogurt product ever released."
“Hey. Lose the spoon. New Yoplait
Go-GURT! The grab and go yogurt!”
General Mills first began working on the idea of fruit snacks in 1975, and the treats really took
off in the 1990s. A favorite was the Scooby-Doo fruit snacks, released in the late 1990s and
getting an added boost when the cartoon "What's New Scooby Doo," premiered in 2002.
Betty Crocker's Scooby-Doo fruit snacks might
just be one of the most iconic and delicious fruit snacks of our time.
Kids and adults alike love Trix Yogurt, which helped it secure our most popular
junk food slot in 2004. The brand successfully marketed to multiple
generations setting it apart from other snacks and food products.
The brand kicked off as a lunchbox favorite in the 90s. Then Trix held special contests in 1995,
1996, 1997, and 2004 to find the "Silliest Kid in America," which kept the brand on TV
screens and in the hearts and minds of kids looking to be affiliated with the brand.
Kid Cuisine moved units by bridging the gap between parents and kids at mealtime. These easy
meals sought to make dinner fun with animal-shaped nuggets, mac and cheese, and dessert offerings. In
the early 2000s, kids knew a good meal was coming when they saw that signature blue dinner tray.
While the brand wasn't exactly healthy in its earlier iterations,
Conagra Brands moved to make it more nutritious in 2005.