03/27/2026
Grocery-store-brand foods used to be terrible. But now they’re the draw—and they genuinely, truly, taste much better than they used to, Ellen Cushing wrote in 2025. https://theatln.tc/aN96ines
In the 1970s, when inflation was high, economic growth was stagnant, and food prices were soaring, a few grocery stores had an idea: They began purchasing their own food straight from the manufacturer, putting it in no-frills packaging, and selling it for significantly less than the name-brand items. These “generics” seemed like a solution to out-of-control costs.
But there were problems: The peas were starchy; the corn was bland. These items “went on the bottom shelf, and both the retailer and the consumer knew that it was an inferior product,” Cushing wrote.
Fifty years later, something similar is happening with the economy, and Americans are turning to store-brand goods again. But this time, Cushing explained, “people actually want to be buying the stuff.” A generic product, now branded as “private label,” comes with all the “surface-level signifiers of exclusivity and refinement that phrase is meant to connote: chic packages, blandly appealing brand names, unique and limited-edition flavors, even if the quality is variable.”
“Grocery stores have a huge incentive to invest in their own private-label goods,” Cushing continued. The margins on these goods are higher, and they give grocery stores bargaining power in the market, because stores are now less reliant on suppliers to stock their shelves. Private-label goods are also a chance for the stores to get their brand in front of people. “This is why Joe Coulombe—you might know him better as Trader Joe—decided to go all in on his own type of grocery-store-branded products,” Cushing wrote. Today, Trader Joe’s is one of “the greatest success stories in American grocery stores.”
But some generic goods are now approaching the same price as national brands. “At some point, a slickly packaged, not-so-inexpensive private label begins to seem like any other brand,” Cushing continued. “When it’s brands, brands, brands, all the way down, they start feeling simply generic: nothing special about them.”
🎨: The Atlantic. Source: ilbusca / Getty.