Stouffer's

Stouffer's logo used from 1992-2006.

Stouffer's is a brand of frozen prepared foods available in the United States and Canada. Stouffer's is known for such popular fare as meatloaf, salisbury steak, lasagna, macaroni and cheese, and ravioli. It also produces a line of reduced-fat products under the banner Lean Cuisine.

History

Stouffer's was founded by Abraham and Lena Stouffer as a small coffee shop in 1922. They had a farm 28 miles south of Cleveland in the township of Richfield, Ohio. In later years, sons Vernon and Gordon expanded it to a chain of restaurants in Cleveland, Detroit, Pittsburgh, New York City and Philadelphia. In the 1950s and 1960s, Stouffer's operated restaurants in Chicago's Prudential Building, which at the time was Chicago's tallest structure. They included the Gibraltar Room, The Plaza Room, The Beaubien Room and the Top Of The Rock on the 40th floor. Vernon Stouffer was a longtime resident of Lakewood, Ohio, a Cleveland suburb. He was active in Cleveland area civic affairs and owned the Cleveland Indians baseball team in the 1970s.

The family's frozen food business began in the 1940s, when customers started asking for frozen versions of the meals served in the restaurants. By 1954, demand had grown to the point the kitchens couldn't keep up, and the Stouffers opened a small processing plant to handle the volume. This operation was separately incorporated in 1956, and began selling to supermarkets a few years later. The Stouffers sold their company to Litton Industries in 1967, who in turn sold it to Nestlé in 1973. Nestle Foods has created a campus-like area at the headquarters in Solon, Ohio. In 1975, Nestle Stouffer's built a food plant which, at that time, was the tallest refrigeration storage facility. In 1990, Nestle built a 5-story complex across the street from Stouffer's. In 2009, Nestle Professional, the foodservice division, opened a culinary R&D research facility, where new food ideas are explored. Stouffer's has a thrift store where the public can buy Stouffer's and Lean Cuisine products at reduced cost.

Packaging changes in 2009

Stouffer's began changing packaging for cooking foods, mainly in family size meals such as lasagna, from PET trays to paperboard trays in late 2009. The company made the move to reduce the impact on the environment, by reducing the amount of PET material dumped into the nation's landfills annually.^[1]

References

1. ^ http://www.packworld.com/webonly-28891

External links

• Nestlé: Stouffer's
• History of Stouffer's at Ohio History Central
• Entry at Encyclopedia of Cleveland History
• Food Porn criticism by Center for Science in the Public Interest