Thanksgiving and the advantage of recipes on labels

The holidays are upon us and first up is Thanksgiving. For many home cooks, the last Thursday of November marks the most daunting and intimidating day of the year. Flustered amateurs hurry around their kitchens to craft the perfect meal for in-laws and extended family members. With all eyes on the chef, so much can go wrong.

This is why established food manufacturers like Butterball have leaned into the anxiety surplus with hotlines, cheat sheets and other support systems for customers in a bind. For many cooks, the surefire solution to their predicament is trusting the recipes on boxes, cans, jars and labels. Rather than leaving consumers to their own devices to find easy, foolproof recipes, many companies publish their perfected approaches to staples like cranberry sauce, gravy, mashed potatoes and pumpkin pie.

“Some of the recipes that we feel most nostalgic about are from the backs of ingredient packages,” writes Rochelle Bilow of Bon Appetite. “Treats made from breakfast cereal, a pie with filling from a can, and boxed biscuits that’ll put grandma to shame, to name a few.”

Thanksgiving is only weeks away but don’t forget other high-stakes holidays like Christmas, Hanukkah and New Year’s Eve. Food manufacturers shouldn’t miss an opportunity to grow brand loyalty through a bit of guidance. When consumers can trust your label, they can trust the integrity of your products. This inspires repeat business and the certainty they’ll use your ingredients for years to come.

“America’s increasingly sophisticated palate, influenced by TV cooking shows, celebrity chefs and gourmet ingredients, presents a problem,” writes Miriam Gottfried of The Wall Street Journal. “Food companies need to figure out how to update their recipes to entice today’s more ambitious cooks to use products that might otherwise sit on the shelf for months.”

Manufacturers that invest in custom label printing technology have flexible, immediate results at their fingertips for runs of all size. However you choose to target your core audience around the holidays, custom labels provide an adaptable platform to give them the information they need.