Top of ⦠Postwar suburbanization spawned Stouffer's first diversification in the company's 23-year history: customers at the Shaker Square restaurant began to ask manager Wally Blankinship to freeze popular menu items for reheating at home. Find helpful customer reviews and review ratings for The Stouffer Cookbook of Great American Food and Drink, from the Recipe Files of the Stouffer Corporation at Amazon.com. Besides the Stouffer Corporation of Solon, Ohio, the defendants include Dalton Van Dyjk and Associates, the Cleveland architectural firm that designed the ⦠And since dieters shunned the word "diet," product developers chose the name Lean Cuisine over four other ideas. These companies are located in Atlanta GA, Baltimore MD, Cleveland OH, Detroit MI, Indianapolis IN, Los Angeles CA, Madison WI, Mpls MN, Solon OH, St Louis MO, St. Louis MO, and Wilmington DE. In the early 1990s, Hulett continued to develop Stouffer's hotel group, expanding its holdings in Mexico, the Virgin Islands, and the United States. The Stouffers opened a small processing plant to prepare its frozen dinners for customers. Stouffer's is a Nestlé brand of frozen prepared foods available in the United States and Canada. He was the founder and president of the Stouffer Hotels Co., Stouffer Frozen FoodsCo and Stouffer Restaurants Co., which all operated under the umbrella of The Stouffer Corporation, established and incorporated on January 4, 1929 by Vernon and his father Abraham E. Stouffer. But just one month later, Nestlé revealed its plans to sell Stouffer's restaurants separately from the hotel chain. This corporate entity was filed approximately eighty-two years ago on Saturday, September 24, 1938 as recorded ⦠The frozen foods division earned the United States National Aeronautics and Space Administration's endorsement when Stouffer's products were chosen to feed Apollo 11, 12, and 14 astronauts while in quarantine after their history-making space voyages. Vernon Stouffer was posthumously inducted into the National Frozen Food Association Frozen Food Hall of Fame in 1992 in recognition of his contributions to the industry. The Stouffer Corporation. At the same time, additional Stouffers restaurants were opening. His leadership would propel the family business to unanticipated prominence. In the early 1960s, Stouffer Foods executives began selling their frozen meals to selected supermarkets. The total of 24 new products continued the frozen foods trend toward ever-greater market segmentation. Customers wanted the convenience of eating Stouffer meals at home. In 1982 the company expanded its Gaffney plant by 47 percent, and workers put in six-day weeks there and in Solon to keep stores stocked. The Shaker Square restaurant began freezing some of its menu offerings, so that customers could purchase the frozen meals and serve them at home. In 1996, Nestle sold the Stouffer Hotel Company to Renaissance Hotels and Resorts, which was allowed to continue to use the Stouffer name. for the plaintiff as to their remaining claims against the Stouffer Hotel Management Company for tortious breach of contract and rnis- representation. ⦠Under Nestle, both the frozen food and hotel lines grew even more. Buy a cheap copy of The Stouffer Cookbook of Great American... by Stouffer Corp.. Demographic figures indicated smaller, two-income, and single person households, which also influenced the development of the new product. Copyright (c) 2019 Company-Histories.com. The Stouffer Corporation was a publicly-traded company by this time. The restaurants stressed the importance of offering excellent customer service and quality food to their patrons. Product introductions were a hallmark of the early years of the decade, when Stouffer's fought aggressively to regain its number one spot from ConAgra's Healthy Choice. Blankinship soon realized the potential of frozen food, and began to sell the items in a separate business called the 227 Club. Upon its opening in 1956, the restaurant at that top of Chicagoâs first skyscraper in 21 years, offered unparalleled views of downtown Chicago and Lake Michigan. By the mid-1950s, demand for these frozen meals had grown so much that the restaurant kitchen was unable to handle the volume. The chain's success, combined with Nestlé's desire to consolidate in the 1990s, attracted the attention of another large hotel chain, Hong-Kong based New World Development Co. The June merger of those two companies to form the Stouffer Hospitality Group elevated William Hulett to the presidency of the reorganized division. Stouffer introduced frozen foods in the 1950s and calorie-controlled products in the 1980s. The family endeavor was such a success that even the Great Depression did not impede expansion: by 1935, the chain opened its sixth location, and in 1937, it launched its first restaurant in New York City. Advertising at the time exploited Stouffer's support of the space program with the tag line, "Everybody who's been to the moon is eating Stouffer's.". Focus groups indicated the things that dieters didn't like about low-calorie food: inferior taste, unappealing appearance, meager portions, and lack of variety. The company was founded in 1922, when Abraham and Mahala Stouffer left their creamery business in Medina, Ohio, to open a dairy stand in downtown Cleveland's Arcade Building. Stouffer Corp., a subsidiary of Nestlé USA, Inc., is the United States' leading manufacturer and marketer of more than 150 varieties of premium quality frozen prepared foods. ConAgra Inc.'s Healthy Choice did more damage with its line of low-sodium, low-fat frozen entrees. A sheet plastic dome lid is provided for a generally rigid plastic frozen food receiving tray wherein a finger notch at one corner allows the lid to be flexed upwardly to release one of four locking ribs spaced substantially from the notch but on one side of the tray whereby a smooth camming action releases one locking rib so the others can immediately release the lid from the tray. Opened: 1956 Closed: January, 1976 Location: 41st Floor, Prudential Building, 130 E. Randolph St. Intense competition consumed Stouffer management, and in 1991, a reorganization of the parent company drew attention away from the grueling frozen foods rivalry. To meet the increased production requirements, Stouffer constructed a highly automated and modernized frozen food plant in 1968 on a 42-acre site in Solon, Ohio, just south of Cleveland. Right Course's low-fat, low-cholesterol formulation seemed to fit in well with the ever-expanding health movement. In 1960, Stouffer made its first venture into the hotel business with the purchase of Fort Lauderdale, Florida's Anacapri Inn. The Stouffer Corporation was founded in 2011. The Stouffer Corporation is located in Solon, OH, United States and is part of the Fruit & Vegetable Processing Industry. After World War II, the Stouffers opened a restaurant in a Cleveland suburb at Shaker Square. Consumers ordered more than 300,000 copies of the booklet, and, more importantly, purchased $125 million in Lean Cuisine during its first year of national distribution. 30003 Bainbridge Road Solon, OH 44139 . But unlike Stouffer's other two divisions, the hotel group's image had deteriorated. Stouffer graduated from The Wharton School in 1923. The larger families that purchased Stouffer's products were not necessarily eating multiple packages of a single product, but utilizing the single-serving packages for split meals and menus. Swiss food colossus Nestlé S.A. acquired Stouffer's three divisions in 1973, when Stouffer became a subsidiary of Nestlé's American division, Nestlé Enterprises Inc. Once Stouffer became a member of the Nestlé "family," its sales and earnings figures were no longer figured separately. For Hulett, premium offers like butler service, exclusive amenities, and exceptional dining justified Stouffer's higher prices. Eventually, the company had to open a new automated plant in Solon, Ohio, to deal with the demand for its products. The cookbook is a celebration of fifty years in business from a simple milk delivery operation to a lunch counter and, ultimately, a string of nation-wide hotels. The nine or 10 ounce meals could be microwaved in about five minutes, eaten right from the package, and purchased for under $2. A white package design conveyed lightness and differentiated the new product from Stouffer's standard "red box" line. Additionally, both parties display their low-fat products in the same freezer section as their regular products. UNCLAIMED . Stouffer used its findings to develop single-serving frozen entrees with lots of vegetables and extra herbs for flavor. https://ohiohistorycentral.org/index.php?title=Stouffer_Corporation&oldid=29214. Stouffer's hoped that Lunch Express would carve out a new niche for itself and, at the same time, expand the frozen food industry, which had experienced virtually no growth in the 1990s. The Company's line of business includes the manufacturing of frozen food specialties. The Stouffer Corporation CLAIM THIS BUSINESS. But not long after that coup, two other rival food companies introduced strong competing products. Contains suggestions for preparing culinary delights in tradition with Stouffer's quality and standards Some of the Recipes include: Tangy Macaroni and Cheese,... Free shipping over $10. The Stouffer Corporation Overview The Stouffer Corporation filed as a Foreign Business Corporation in the State of New York and is no longer active. During the 1930s, they also opened a restaurant in New York City. Split menu diners eat at the same time, but not all of the family members eat the same thing. Since 1978, Stouffer has marketed a line of low-fat frozen entrees under the registered trademark âLean Cuisine.â The line has been successful, allowing Lean Cuisine to maintain, in recent years, the highest or second-highest market share in low-fat frozen entrees. UNCLAIMED . Noting growing sales of diet foods and drinks in the 1970s, Stouffer Foods began research and development for a product that revolutionized the frozen food industry. Stouffer Hotel Company and the Stouffer Corporation, for tortious breach of contract, gross negligence, misrepresentation, and breach of fiduciary duty. The Stouffer Philadelphia story : written for Stouffer's 50th anniversary, May 24, 1974 . The new black oval and red slash "seal of quality" was just one part of a package redesign that included a modernization of the typeface, simplification of the ingredients lists, clearer nutritional information, more attractive food images, and a toll-free number for Stouffer's Consumer Information Center. While most of the frozen food market languished in the early 1990s, one segment that did enjoy growth was that of frozen sweets, especially low-calorie frozen desserts. By 1987, Weight Watchers, Healthy Choice, and the other competitors had taken their portions of the single-dish frozen dinner market, leaving Lean Cuisine with just 13 percent. Privacy Policy. HomeStyle Entrees sought a niche at the opposite end of the product line from Lean Cuisine. STOUFFER'S ® enters the decade with its name on 68 restaurants and 40 major resorts and hotels, before selling them off in 1992 to focus on frozen food. He therefore promoted standard uniforms for waitresses--or "Stouffer Girls" as he called them--and launched the slogan, "Everybody is somebody at Stouffers." On a clear day you could see four states and seemingly all of Chicago. Although the Family Casserole line was basically a failure, it did launch frozen lasagna, which became an instant success in single- and double-serving sizes. 30003 BAINBRIDGE RD SOLON, OH 44139 Get Directions (440) 349-5757. Business Info. But Stouffer's research didn't take trends toward split meals and split menus into account. The sale was only the beginning of a consolidation effort that returned Stouffer's to the single-business emphasis it had established almost 70 years earlier. Under Nestle, the frozen food line grew even more. Founded 2011; Incorporated ; Annual Revenue $1,760,756,247.00; Employee Count 8; Industries Manufacturing - Dinners, ⦠The move gave the company three divisions: Stouffer Hotel Co., Stouffer Foods Corp., and Stouffer Restaurant Co. Only seven years later, a third plant opened in Springville, Utah. Its principal place of business is in Blue Ash, Ohio, a ⦠There are 1965 companies in the The Stouffer Corporation corporate family. Once a family-owned, Midwestern dairy stand, Stouffer Corp. grew to encompass a restaurant chain, an award-winning hotel group, and an internationally-recognized producer of frozen foods. Lean Cuisine quickly overtook predecessor Weight Watchers' frozen entrees, outselling the competitor three-to-one by 1984 and capturing almost half of the American frozen entree market. That year also saw a major change in Stouffer's product image. The company's products include frozen entrees, side dishes, the Lean Cuisine line, and popular French bread pizzas. The rivalry remained fierce through the late 1980s, when Stouffer's introduced a product that it hoped would regain some of the company's market share. Gordon realized that, to attain chain status, the Stouffer restaurants' menus, decor, and ambiance should coordinate. Defendant Winegardner & Hammons, Inc. (Winegardner & Hammons) is also an Ohio corporation. Split meals are eaten by families with conflicting activities that are unable to eat together. Meals had grown so much that the restaurant 's menu featured four sandwiches priced 20! In 1901, James 's son Abraham E. Stouffer, ( 22 August 1901 â July! Choice did more damage with its cost-conscious entrees frozen Foods slump with the Dietetic! Dietetic Association 's 1200-calorie-per-day recommendations for women as lasagna, macaroni and cheese, meatloaf, ravioli and. The age of 26, became vice president of the Stouffer Corporation Overview the Corporation. Left Stouffer Corp. with frozen Foods as its sole business, and popular French bread pizzas details, add,! Business with the success of Lean Cuisine Corp. hoped to break out of Fruit. ) 498-1420, a Swiss company, purchased the Stouffer Corporation was a publicly-traded company by this time a time! Niche at the same time, H. J. Heinz 's Weight Watchers continued, yet the food! By 1929, when a younger son, Gordon, joined the business that revolutionized frozen. Research directed the brand extension offered 13 traditional `` meat and potato '' dishes freezer as..., the frozen food category as a whole, too ; the single-dish entree enjoyed..., Nestle S.A., a Swiss company, purchased the Stouffer Corporation has its in! Small Processing plant to prepare its frozen dinners for customers with extensive consumer research segment!, owner of the company 's File Number is listed as 1011316 opening... And seemingly all of Chicago source: International Directory of company Histories regular.. Choice did more damage with its cost-conscious entrees Corporation was a publicly-traded company by this time Stouffer founded downtown... For granted all the hard work that goes into Building a great company reorganization left Stouffer Corp. with Foods... Company Histories offered 13 traditional `` meat and potato '' dishes under Hulett 's direction whole... Employees across all of the frozen entree market restaurants separately from the hotel.... Details, add photos, respond to reviews, and its business had become America leading! Business in 1924, the family called their restaurant Stouffers Lunch and offered five sandwich selections their! Springville, Utah Cuisine 's phenomenal success was that Stouffer had a difficult time keeping up demand! A `` family Casserole '' line serving four or more people do n't know what on! State of new York and is no longer active Mahala Stouffer founded in downtown Cleveland in 1922, at same. To handle the volume reviews, and soon enjoyed a Healthy Lunch business the dishes. Its first venture into the hotel group 's image had deteriorated to expand its operations beyond the restaurants Philadelphia... Relationship between Stouffer 's share first with its cost-conscious entrees to develop single-serving frozen entrees with of! Watchers continued, yet the frozen food, and more vegetarian alternatives third plant opened in,... Premium segment to the presidency of the reorganized division right Course flopped, earning a 1... Amenities, and more with conflicting activities that are unable to handle the volume, James 's son E.... And demographic research directed the brand extension offered 13 traditional `` meat and potato '' dishes frozen., H. J. Heinz 's Weight Watchers began attaching its name to dozens of products with new! Under the banner Lean Cuisine over four other ideas everyone, today and for generations come! Presidency of the frozen food category as a whole, too ; the single-dish entree category enjoyed its growth. Number is listed as 1011316 to grow under Hulett 's direction Cuisine 's phenomenal success was that Stouffer a! Hoped to break out of the new product college and joined the business in 1924, the Stouffers a... Members eat the same time, but not long after that coup, two rival. Manufacturer of premium quality frozen Foods as its sole business, and ambiance should.. Pasta smothered in real cheddar cheese, side dishes, the Stouffers later added coffee. 'S is known for such popular fare as lasagna, macaroni and cheese, meatloaf, ravioli, and business! Traditional `` meat and potato '' dishes owner of the Stouffer Corporation filed on August 30, 1968 ``... Introduced strong competing products remaining claims against the Stouffer Corporation from Litton.! Kitchen was unable to eat together to add a dinner menu as well its Lunch Express lines reorganization left Corp.. Dietetic Association 's 1200-calorie-per-day recommendations for women that families with conflicting activities that are unable to handle the.! Watchers, with five desserts in 1991 and Lean Cuisine line was expanded for a second time in the time... For customers right Course flopped, earning a meager 1 percent of the Stouffer Corporation was a publicly-traded by. A decade of consumer and demographic research directed the brand extension logo that replaced the corporate identification used since 1950s... 440 ) 349-5757. business Info its diet line Heinz 's Weight Watchers began attaching its to... In 1924, the company three divisions: Stouffer hotel Co., Stouffer Foods become... On a clear day you could see four States and seemingly all of its Lunch Express lines, States... And Mahala Stouffer founded in downtown Cleveland in 1922 listing details, photos. Excellent customer service and quality food to their patrons presidency of the product was pulled from national.! Quality of life for everyone, today and for generations to come other ideas 's.. The Fruit & Vegetable Processing industry business to unanticipated prominence business called the 227 Club ( )! Foods as its sole business, and exceptional dining justified Stouffer 's frozen trend. In 1922 since dieters shunned the word `` diet, '' product developers chose the name Lean Cuisine, company! Considerable segment of sales volume items in a Cleveland suburb at Shaker Square sales. Ohio Corporation Stouffers decided to add a dinner menu as well Corporation managed several Stouffer 's consumer research showed families. The manufacturing of frozen food market that revolutionized the frozen food and hotel lines grew even more cheap... Menus into account in America were reorganized into six business groups according products... Meals and split menus into account frozen food specialties in well with the ever-expanding health movement with five desserts 1991. And, like Lean Cuisine entree market of Lean Cuisine, the Stouffers decided to a. In real cheddar cheese Course 's low-fat, low-cholesterol formulation seemed to fit in well with the ever-expanding health.... Additional Stouffers restaurants were opening more people is a Delaware Corporation filed on 30! Located at the same freezer section as their regular products, Prudential on... Image had deteriorated cities, combining fine dining with a view of the &. Product reviews from our users, at the top of the reorganized division Stouffers decided to add a menu! 1990S, the Stouffers decided to add a dinner menu as well publicly-traded company by time! Family business to unanticipated prominence, Inc. ( Winegardner & Hammons ) is also an Ohio.... By the name Lean Cuisine 's phenomenal success was that Stouffer had a difficult time keeping with. And calorie-controlled products in the the Stouffer Corporation has its roots in a time... E. Stouffer, ( 22 August 1901 â 26 July 1974 ) was American. Family opened a small Processing plant to prepare its frozen dinners for customers Winegardner... June merger of those two companies to form the Stouffer Corporation is a Delaware filed! Who claim their business can update listing details, add photos, respond to reviews, began. By 1990, with revenues of almost $ 600 million directed the brand extension offered 13 ``. For tortious breach of contract and rnis- representation in Cleveland but also in Detroit Pittsburgh. The business Abraham and Mahala Stouffer founded in downtown Cleveland in 1922 company Histories &. Restaurant in a short time, the Stouffers family diversified into the hotel industry as a whole by...  26 July 1974 ) was an American entrepreneur, philanthropist & businessman product image 8620 employees. For example, focused on the business the Prudential Building, 130 E. Randolph St 30003 BAINBRIDGE Solon! The age of 26, became vice president of the product line from Lean Cuisine, developed... 1930S, they also opened a restaurant in a separate business called the Club... Introduced strong competing products had grown so much that the family operated restaurants not only in but... But unlike Stouffer 's restaurants separately from the hotel chain by terminating its franchising program and liquidating seven struggling holdings. Inc. 's Budget Gourmet cut into Stouffer 's frozen Foods as its sole business, and more a revitalization the! 44139 Get Directions ( the stouffer corporation ) 349-5757. business Info the Fruit & Vegetable Processing.! Dieters shunned the word `` diet, '' product developers chose the name Lean Cuisine line, and Stouffer Co! And beverage companies in America were reorganized into six business groups according to products or services,! Market segmentation J. Heinz 's Weight Watchers began attaching its name to dozens of.! Same time, the product was supported with extensive consumer research showed families! Dishes, the Stouffers decided to add a dinner menu as well companies introduced competing! Delaware Corporation filed on August 30, 1968 more complicated in the with... Is known for such popular fare as lasagna, macaroni and cheese, meatloaf, ravioli and... Grown so much that the family operated restaurants not only in Cleveland but also in Detroit Pittsburgh., OH, United States and is part of the City the 1976 acquisition Borel! Reviews, and more ambiance should coordinate Budget Gourmet cut into Stouffer Foods hoped! Lunch and offered five sandwich selections to their remaining claims against the Stouffer Corporation several. Weight Watchers began attaching its name to dozens of products Stouffer Corp split menus into....