Changes in American Food Culture since the Mid-20th Century
Background
The Kitchen & Kitchen Appliances
During the mid-20th century the American Kitchen began to undergo a major transformation that changed the way Americans used and viewed the kitchen. Prior to the 1950’s the kitchen in America was viewed very utilitarian like. The kitchen was usually placed in the back of the house and purposely closed off from the rest of the home. However, during the 1950’s and the rise of Levittown’s, brought in a new image of the kitchen as open as it became more of the forefront of the home. Levittown homes put a great deal of emphasis on the kitchen and its new transformation as modern, time-saving and efficient. The home’s kitchens would include with them new kitchen appliances such as a refrigerator, dishwasher, gas stove, and cabinets. Additionally, during the 1950s consumerism and the buying of goods came to hold great cultural significance. The middle class saw a boom of wealth during this century and consumerism became a key characteristic of this era. Owning, buying and engaging in consumption became symbols of freedom, ease, modernity, and convenience previously only accessible to the rich. Electric companies such as general electric began to create new kitchen tools that not only promoted the use of electricity, but that would be seen as easing the load of women’s time in the kitchen. Kitchen products and appliances began to be made cheaper and thus more accessible to middle class Americans. The goal of buying these products was to give house wives more leisure time, the more products they bought the more time the products advertised they would save women. With this new gained leisure time, women were supposed to have more time to spend with their family and children. Today our modern American kitchen and kitchen utensils are a direct result of the major changes undergone during the 1950s and onward.
Fast Food
In the 1950s and 1960s, there were many new innovations that helped fast food change the restaurant industry and consequently how the world eats today. The idea of eating outside of the home has been around for a long time, but the beginning of the fast food industry that we know about of didn’t start until the post-World War II economic boom in America. Americans started to buy and spend more as the age of consumerism bloomed. As with this new desire to have it all and coupled with the accomplishments of working women while men were away at war, both men and women began to work outside of the home. Eating fast food instantly became a convenient necessity. This need for quick and inexpensive food is what made the fast food industry so successful.
The fast food revolution started in the 1920s when the first White Castle opened in Wichita, Kansas and was built upon by McDonald’s in the 1940s. Following McDonalds’ success, popularity of fast food grew quickly with an exponential increase of new franchises in the 1950s. And while most of the new fast food restaurants sold burgers and fries, there was an emerging number of restaurants that served exotic fast food as well, such as Taco Bell. These new fast food restaurants succeed as people responded well to cheap food, fast service and consistency.The food could also be replicated very easily and so franchising spread across the country.
There are many fast food franchises still around today that got their start during the 1950’s. These include:
McDonald’s in San Bernardino, California
Wendy’s in Columbus, Ohio
Burger King, Jacksonville, Florida
Taco Bell, San Bernardino, California
KFC in Salt Lake City, Utah
Denny’s in Lakewood, California
Pizza Hut in Wichita, Kansas
Dunkin’ Donuts in Quincy, Massachusetts
By the 1970s,as the food industry continue toexpandand there was competition within all the franchises. This triggered the “Burger Wars” of the 80s and 90s. Fast food restaurants needed to reinvent themselves and emphasize their brands. There was a rise in food restaurants adding the iconic drive-thru and also most appealed to families starting meals specifically targeted for kids. Also healthier options and new menu items differentiated the chains from each other.
At the beginning of the 21st century, there was an increased interest in coffee chains and fast casual restaurants, such as Chipotle, Panera and Starbucks. These chains focused on the quality of their products and making their restaurants appealing to eat in. The new driving force of the economy are the Millennials, who like the Baby Boomers want something fast and easy but also want new accommodations like WiFi or environments to study in.
Cookbooks & Recipes
Cookbooks during the mid-20th century started to appear in the homes of every family country wide. Why all the sudden did cookbooks become popular? During this era there was a rise in Levittown homes, and there was a huge emphasis on the kitchen and the appliances to go with them. Cooking in the 1940s was rather bland, thankfully during the 1950s Betty Crocker came out with a cookbook that would change the recipes during this era. Every family country wide cooked using this cookbook. There was a large increase in production and consumption of kitchen appliances. In the cookbooks it would say, "this job could be done easier with a blender" and would give a recommended blender to promote the brand. It was said that every American husband was coming home to a Betty Crocker recipe cooked meal. Over time cookbooks became available in every language and for every culture. A main difference between the 1950s and the current era is the availability of food. During the mid-20th century you could not go to a grocery store and find food of different ethnicities, in today's markets, you can go to world markets and find foods from every country in the world!
Advertising Food Products
Back in the 1950's (Mid 20th Century), food advertisement was the way to inform modern family homes about the types of food brands they can buy such as groceries, snacks, TV dinners, and fast food chains. It was also at this time that television units were being placed into homes and soon became America's number one way to be updated on recent events. By combining both, fast food chains were able to reach out to the people and give them the message that delicious affordable meals were ready for pick up, at family convenience. But as fast food chains and other industries grew larger and times slowly progressing, the old message of family convenience began to fade away and soon became about appealing to specific demographics. This caused certain marketing tactics to become extremely popular in the use of media advertising and was the industries way of labeling target demographics. This is how, over time, food advertisement has changed from the 50's to recent times. This website will also inform you about how a fast food chain uses one tactic to target their demographic and essentially saying that the demographic is all about the tactic in use.