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Company type | Private (1937–61) Subsidiary (1961–present) |
---|---|
Industry | Food |
Founded | 1937 |
Founder | Margaret Rudkin |
Fate | Sold to Campbell's in 1961 |
Headquarters | Norwalk, Connecticut, U.S. |
Key people | Kenneth Gosnell |
Products | Cookies, crackers, breads, desserts |
Brands | Goldfish |
Parent | Campbell's |
Website | pepperidgefarm.com |
Pepperidge Farm is an American commercial bakery founded in 1937 by Margaret Rudkin, who named the brand after her family's 123-acre farm property in Fairfield, Connecticut, [1] which had been named for the pepperidge tree.
A subsidiary of the Campbell Soup Company since 1961, it is based in Norwalk, Connecticut. On January 18, 2023, the company announced plans to close its Norwalk headquarters, consolidating jobs held there to Campbell Soup Company headquarters in Camden, New Jersey. [2]
Margaret Rudkin began baking bread in 1937 for her youngest son, Mark, who had asthma and was allergic to most commercially processed foods. [3] Her son's doctor recommended the bread to his other patients and encouraged her to sell it to the public. Her first commercial sale was to her local grocer in Fairfield, Conn., Mercurio's Market. Rudkin's husband Henry, a Wall Street broker, began taking loaves of bread with him to New York to be sold in specialty stores. [4] Rudkin moved the growing business out of her kitchen and into her garage, and then into a factory in 1940. Rationing during World War II forced her to cut back production due to the restricted availability of quality ingredients. [5] In 1947, Rudkin opened a modern commercial bakery in Norwalk, Connecticut, and soon after added plants in Illinois and Pennsylvania. [4]
On a trip to Europe in the 1950s, Rudkin discovered fancy chocolate cookies that she believed would be popular in the United States. She bought the rights to produce and sell them, and the Distinctive Cookies line was born. Under her management, Pepperidge Farm continued to expand into other products, including frozen pastry items and, later, the Goldfish snack cracker from Switzerland. [4] In 1961, she sold the business to the Campbell Soup Company for $28 million and became the first woman to serve on its board of directors. [5] She drew on her knowledge and experience to write The Margaret Rudkin Pepperidge Farm Cookbook in 1963, [6] which was the first cookbook ever to make the New York Times Best Seller list. [4]
The Pepperidge Farm logo is based on the Grist Mill in Sudbury, Massachusetts, which supplied the company with 48 tons of whole wheat flour monthly from 1952 to 1967. [7]
During the 1970s and 80s, the company used the slogan "Pepperidge Farm remembers" for a long-running television commercial campaign that leaned heavily upon nostalgia, particularly of life in the early decades of the 20th century.
Pepperidge Farm products include Goldfish crackers, varieties of bread, and several lines of cookies. Their cookies are separated into two lines, the Distinctive line and the Farmhouse line. Each type of cookie from the "Distinctive" line is named for a European city such as the Milano cookie or the Brussels cookie. [8] The Distinctives cannot be readily replicated by home bakers. In contrast, the Farmhouse line emphasizes commonplace cookies like chocolate chip and shortbread types that anyone could bake for themselves in an ordinary home kitchen.
Examples of Pepperidge Farm products include: [9]
Mix Cheddar + Zesty Cheddar + Parmesan Mix Xtra Cheddar + Pretzel
A cookie or biscuit is a baked snack or dessert that is typically small, flat, and sweet. It usually contains flour, sugar, egg, and some type of oil, fat, or butter. It may include other ingredients such as raisins, oats, chocolate chips, or nuts.
New England cuisine is an American cuisine which originated in the New England region of the United States, and traces its roots to traditional English cuisine and Native American cuisine of the Abenaki, Narragansett, Niantic, Wabanaki, Wampanoag, and other native peoples. It also includes influences from Irish, French-Canadian, Italian, and Portuguese cuisine, among others. It is characterized by extensive use of potatoes, beans, dairy products and seafood, resulting from its historical reliance on its seaports and fishing industry. Corn, the major crop historically grown by Native American tribes in New England, continues to be grown in all New England states, primarily as sweet corn although flint corn is grown as well. It is traditionally used in hasty puddings, cornbreads and corn chowders.
Baking is a method of preparing food that uses dry heat, typically in an oven, but can also be done in hot ashes, or on hot stones. The most common baked item is bread, but many other types of foods can be baked. Heat is gradually transferred "from the surface of cakes, cookies, and pieces of bread to their center, typically conducted at elevated temperatures surpassing 300°F. Dry heat cooking imparts a distinctive richness to foods through the processes of caramelization and surface browning. As heat travels through, it transforms batters and doughs into baked goods and more with a firm dry crust and a softer center. Baking can be combined with grilling to produce a hybrid barbecue variant by using both methods simultaneously, or one after the other. Baking is related to barbecuing because the concept of the masonry oven is similar to that of a smoke pit.
A cracker is a flat, dry baked biscuit typically made with flour. Flavorings or seasonings, such as salt, herbs, seeds, or cheese, may be added to the dough or sprinkled on top before baking. Crackers are often branded as a nutritious and convenient way to consume a staple food or cereal grain.
Dough is a thick, malleable, sometimes elastic paste made from grains or from leguminous or chestnut crops. Dough is typically made by mixing flour with a small amount of water or other liquid and sometimes includes yeast or other leavening agents, as well as ingredients such as fats or flavorings.
A bakery is an establishment that produces and sells flour-based baked goods made in an oven such as bread, cookies, cakes, doughnuts, bagels, pastries, and pies. Some retail bakeries are also categorized as cafés, serving coffee and tea to customers who wish to consume the baked goods on the premises. In some countries, a distinction is made between bakeries, which primarily sell breads, and pâtisseries, which primarily sell sweet baked goods.
Pennsylvania Dutch cuisine is the typical and traditional fare of the Pennsylvania Dutch.
Goldfish is a brand of fish-shaped cracker with a small imprint of an eye and a smile manufactured by Pepperidge Farm, which is a division of the Campbell Soup Company. The brand's current marketing and product packaging incorporate this feature of the product: "The Snack That Smiles Back! Goldfish!", reinforced by Finn, the smiling goldfish mascot with sunglasses. The product is marketed as a "baked snack cracker" on the label with various flavors and varieties.
Czech cuisine has both influenced and been influenced by the cuisines of surrounding countries and nations. Many of the cakes and pastries that are popular in Central Europe originated within the Czech lands. Contemporary Czech cuisine is more meat-based than in previous periods; the current abundance of farmable meat has enriched its presence in regional cuisine. Traditionally, meat has been reserved for once-weekly consumption, typically on weekends.
Margaret Loreta Rudkin was an American businesswoman who founded Pepperidge Farm and was the first female member of the board at the Campbell Soup Company.
Monkey bread is a soft, sweet, sticky pastry served in the United States for breakfast or as a treat. It consists of pieces of soft baked dough sprinkled with cinnamon. It is often a midmorning/breakfast food and usually served at fairs and festivals.
The Campbell Soup Company, doing business as Campbell's, is an American company, most closely associated with its flagship canned soup products; however through mergers and acquisitions, it has grown to become one of the largest processed food companies in the United States with a wide variety of products under its flagship Campbell's brand as well as other brands including Pepperidge Farm, Snyder's of Hanover, V8, and Swanson. With its namesake brand Campbell's produces soups and other canned foods, baked goods, beverages, and snacks. It is headquartered in Camden, New Jersey.
Angel Bakeries, also known as Angel's Bakery, is the largest commercial bakery in Israel, producing 275,000 loaves of bread and 275,000 rolls daily and controlling 30 percent of the country's bread market. With a product line of 100 different types of bread products and 250 different types of cakes and cookies, Angel sells its goods in 32 company-owned outlets nationwide and distributes to 6,000 stores and hundreds of hotels and army bases. It also exports to the United States, United Kingdom, France, Belgium and Denmark.
The cheese cracker is a type of cracker prepared using cheese as a main ingredient. Additional common cracker ingredients are typically used, such as grain, flour, shortening, leavening, salt and various seasonings. The ingredients are formed into a dough, and the individual crackers are then prepared. Some cheese crackers are prepared using fermented dough. Cheese crackers are typically baked. Another method of preparing cheese crackers involves placing cheese atop warm crackers. Cheese crackers have been described as a "high-calorie snack", which is due to a higher fat content compared to other types of crackers.
Korean baked goods consists of either snacks or bread. Examples include bread, buns, pastries, cakes, and snacks.