Merita is a brand of breads that was produced by

Hostess Brands Hostess Brands is an American-based bakery company formed in 2013. It owns several bakeries in the United States that produce snack cakes under the Hostess and Dolly Madison brand names and its Canadian subsidiary, Voortman Cookies Limited, pro ...

and now produced by

Flowers Foods Flowers Foods, headquartered in Thomasville, Georgia, is a producer and marketer of packed bakery food. The company operates 47 bakeries producing bread, buns, rolls, snack cakes, pastries, and tortillas. Flowers Foods' products are sold regi ...

, available throughout the

Southeastern United States The Southeastern United States, also referred to as the American Southeast or simply the Southeast, is a geographical region of the United States. It is located broadly on the eastern portion of the southern United States and the southern por ...

until November 16, 2012, when Hostess's management decided to liquidate Hostess. The company gave as their reason for this action that they had been crippled by a strike by BCTGM, the bakers' union. Union spokespersons attributed the company's situation to poor management over a long period of years. On January 11, 2013,

purchased the brand from Hostess.

Origins

William Fisch and Herman Malchow, who for three years had been operating a lunchroom in Birmingham, Alabama, established the Highland Bakery, which began producing breads in 1901. Starting with a single horse-and-wagon route and one retail bakeshop, the business grew and flourished. Legend has it that in the company's early years, an award known as the MERIT-A award, signifying highest merit, was conferred on some bakery products. This company consistently won the award and displayed the symbol “MERIT-A” on the packages. By mistake, a printer left out the hyphen and thus the name MERITA was born. In 1910, Highland Baking Company merged with the Martin Cracker and Candy Company and the Huston Biscuit Company to form American Bakeries Candy Company. In 1912 candy production was halted, and the company was incorporated as American Bakeries Company, Inc. Merita set up its first “bakery research laboratory” in 1921 to guard the purity and quality of its raw materials all the way through to finished products. The Merita division of American Bakeries was purchased by

Interstate Bakeries Corporation Old HB, Inc., known as Hostess Brands from 2009 to 2013 and established in 1930 as Interstate Bakeries Corporation, was a wholesale baker and distributor of bakery products in the United States. Before its 2012 closure and liquidation, it owned ...

(later Hostess Brands, Inc.) in 1988. After the closure and liquidation of Hostess Brands in late 2012, Merita was sold to

for $390 million, in a deal that also included other Hostess bread brands such as

Wonder Bread Wonder Bread is a brand of sliced bread which originated in the United States in 1921 and was one of the first to be sold pre-sliced nationwide in 1930. The brand is currently owned by Flowers Foods in the United States. History The Taggart Bak ...

Nature's Pride Nature's Pride is an all-natural brand of bread produced by Flowers Foods in the United States. It was previously produced by Hostess Brands, which closed its operations in the wake of a BCTGM bakers' union strike and entered liquidation proceed ...

, Home Pride and Butternut.

Marketing

In 1938 Merita brought

The Lone Ranger The Lone Ranger is a fictional masked former Texas Ranger who fought outlaws in the American Old West with his Native American friend Tonto. The character has been called an enduring icon of American culture. He first appeared in 1933 in ...

radio adventures to the South for the first time. Broadcasts were three times a week for a half-hour on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Additionally, in 1949, Merita becoming the first advertiser in the South to sponsor a network television program when it sponsored The Lone Ranger

television Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertisin ...

show. Muppets, Inc. produced six 10-second commercials for Merita Bread in 1963 for markets in the southern US. The ads featured Wilkins and Wontkins. In November 2010, Merita became the "official bread" of the

Southeastern Conference The Southeastern Conference (SEC) is an American college athletic conference whose member institutions are located primarily in the South Central and Southeastern United States. Its fourteen members include the flagship public universities of ...

(SEC) and all SEC Championship events through June 2013.http://www.bakingbusiness.com/en/News/News%20Home/Business/2010/11/Merita%20Southeastern%20Conference%20in%20partnership.aspx

References

External links

{{commons
Merita Breads
(defunct) Brand name breads Flowers Foods brands

Origins

Marketing

See also

References

External links