Any body remember black label stuff?

[NM_Shooter]

I was a kid, and I remember the black label canned goods.  What was the deal with that?  Was that a government subsidized cheap food thing or ??

[MountainDon]

I thought this was about good Scotch Whisky. 

Other than that I have never heard of black label....   

Looking forward to more info.   

[NM_Shooter]

I thought it was called black label groceries... but I wasn't really paying attention.  Actually, it was a white label with black print, and it was very cheap food.  Maybe this was just a generic label for local groceries 

[rick91351]

I know Albertsons carried the same thing.  Lasted a year or so then one day POOF!!! All gone.

[Don_P]

Generic food. The Beer said BEER , Falstaff made it IIRC. We're funny, nobody wanted to be seen with "generic food" in their cart. Now if it has a brand name on it, that's just fine. It has "Sam's" or whatever brand on it now. "Sell the sizzle, not the steak"

[RainDog]

Don, that's funny as hell. I'd never thought about it, but you're absolutely right. Printing a glossy three color label isn't costly enough to offset the lost revenue from people not buying a product that might as well have "Poor People Food" written across it in bold letters.

I didn't buy the stuff because I figured it was substandard in the back of my mind, but yeah, I wouldn't have really wanted guests to my home seeing my shelves lined with poor people food either.

A marketing disaster, that was.

[Whitlock]

Generic food. The Beer said BEER , Falstaff made it IIRC. We're funny, nobody wanted to be seen with "generic food" in their cart. Now if it has a brand name on it, that's just fine. It has "Sam's" or whatever brand on it now. "Sell the sizzle, not the steak"

It is funny how most of us remenbered the generic beer

[NM_Shooter]

I was wondering who actually canned that stuff.  Was it some sort of gov't mass production thing, or what?  Now it sounds as though it was all over the US, which is what I suspected. 

At one point, my dad worked for a canning company in Chicago, assembling and maintaining the canning machines.  It was "something" "Farms".  (Pepperage Farms maybe?) They had a huge production printing issue in which a very large run of produce had the wrong labels applied.   Carrots, corn, peas, whatever..... all messed up.  They ended up tearing off all the labels and selling unmarked cases of food for $1 a case.  I remember we had cases of mystery veggies in the basement.  Most of the stuff was consistent.  ONce you opened a can from a case, you were pretty sure what the others in that case were.   But no guarantees you were going to get peas with your meatloaf on friday night 

[rick91351]

I have been 'clean and sober' since 1989 or 90    I do remember the generic beer - never drank any I ever remember of.  We did eat some generic peas, green beans and corn and lived.  But by golly you have to draw the line some where you know.  Generic Beer -- Yuck!!!  Gawd knows where it came from. 

HHUUMM!! Don't ever remember any generic whiskey or vodka.... generic vodka and generic tomato juice???  Hey pass the generic pretzels, and peanuts.....

[muldoon]

in alot of cases, the generic is the same product as the premium name brands.  they just used different packaging and did not spend money on advertising and name brand recognition.  it's just business, same as toyota selling both the camry and the lexus - under the hood they are both share huge parts and engineeering - but the marketing and price tag on it defines the targetted audience. 

they have mostly ditched the white labels with black letters from what I have seen and gone to "store" brands - like sams brand, or kroger brand, its the same stuff and the food companies bid to get the contract.  have a look at ingrediants and you'll see in many many cases the exact same things. 

might as well try generic beer, nearly all of the american light lagers taste the same to me and I do not particularly care for the "premiums" in that category.  I would rather have a generic porter, stout, heffe, or bock than a bud or coors.  But thats just me. 

[kenhill]

I remember "Mabel, Black Lable"  for Carling Black Label Beer

[Whitlock]

When I was a forest fire fighter they gave us canned water that was made by Budwiser and it also looked generic.
Sorry it didn't taste like beer more like aluminum flavored water

[rwanders]

  Now some stores sell "premium" store brands----Costco sells under the Kirkland brand and I have found it to often be superior to the old "brand name" merchandise. Seems like all the store brands are pretty good these days---the first generic brands were pretty lame as I remember.

[rick91351]

Kenhill brought up Carling  I remember Hey Mabel Black Label - Carling Black Label Beer, William Pen (What this country needs is a good 5 cent cigar) and Cigars, cigarettes, Tiparillo's? - should a man offer a lady a Tiparillo?  They all advertised on the Friday night fights, or was it the Saturday night fights?     

[JRR]

Hadn't thought much about Carlings Black Label until being reminded here.  Did a search and found this:
.
http://heymabelblacklabel.com/id23.htm
.
Today I live very close to the old "near Atlanta" brewery site.