The Surprising Origin of the Green-Bean Casserole
Thanksgiving is 17 days away. (Can you believe it?)
And, besides Turkey and stuffing, one of the most common side dishes that we’ll all have is the “Green-Bean Casserole”.
Have you ever wondered… How did this recipe become an American tradition?
You might be surprised, but it’s because of content marketing. Let me explain.
In 1955, a chef named Dorcas Reilly created the recipe for a cookbook that was being created to promote Campbell’s products.
Look at the recipe more closely and you can see the product they are promoting…
Green Bean Casserole Recipe
Ingredients
1 cup milk
2 teaspoons soy sauce
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
8 cups cooked cut green beans
2 2/3 cups French’s® French Fried Onions
How to Make It
1 Stir the soup, milk, soy sauce, black pepper, beans and 1 1/3 cups onions in a 3-quart casserole.
2 Bake at 350°F. for 25 minutes or until the bean mixture is hot and bubbling. Stir the bean mixture. Sprinkle with the remaining onions.
3. Bake for 5 minutes or until the onions are golden brown.
Did you catch it?
The recipe that so many of us love so much was created to sell Campbell’s® Condensed Cream of Mushroom Soup.
But we need to ask ourselves, “Why did it work?”
It worked because they focused on the thing that mattered most: the content.
Campbell’s marketing department didn’t try and make up a recipe in order to sell more mushroom soup.
No. Instead they had a chef who was a part of their home economics department create it. Why?
Because they wanted the recipe (the content) to be something people would want to make over and over.
And it worked.
Almost 50 years later, that recipe is still selling Campbell’s® Condensed Cream of Mushroom Soup.
Content Marketing Lesson: In order to create effective content marketing, make sure that you focus on the content part, more than the marketing part.
Learn from Campell’s.
Make sure the content in your content marketing is superb, helpful, and usable for your target market.
If you do, you might come up with something that will still be selling your product or service 50 years now.
Source: Mentalfloss.com and CampbellsKitchen.com
NOTE: This post is featured in my book “51 Content Marketing Hacks”. If you liked this post, you’ll probably like the book. You can learn more about it here.
Photo by LWYang
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I’m a business strategist, consultant, content creation specialist, and speaker. I’ve been studying effective marketing and business methods (both online and offline) since 1999.
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