Tag: Country Crock

We Call Out the Crock for What It Isn’t

Posted on by Rachel Ravencraft

Crock /kräk/ (noun). 1. An earthenware pot or jar. 2. (North American, informal) Something considered to be complete nonsense.

Yup. And there they go again.

Country Crock, which for generations has had the unfortunate challenge of being in the margarine business, is continuing its tradition of trying to make consumers think they make butter, this time through peddling a product called “dairy-free salted butter.” That may have consumer appeal in some areas, and it’s easy to see why a product would want to draw on the popular consumer benefits of butter. But unfortunately (again) for them, there’s a big problem: Under congressional legislation and FDA standards, the product they’re claiming to make can’t actually exist.

Once more, with feeling. Dairy products are animal products, and “this product as labeled implies it is butter made without cow’s milk — which is unlawful, according to Congress’s definition of butter in 1906,” says a letter from the American Butter Institute, which is managed and staffed by NMPF, sent to FDA late last month.

“Because the Country Crock product’s principal display panel prominently bears the term ‘Butter,’ includes an image of a traditional red barn associated with dairy farms and employs an image of butter, there can be no mistake about the marketer’s intent to identify itself as butter, which is preferred by consumers, rather than what it is, a plant-based spread similar to margarine.”

Exactly.

It’s easy to understand why Country Crock keeps wanting to call its products butter. Butter demand continues to surge. On a rolling 12-month average, U.S consumer butter sales in May were 4.3 percent higher than a year earlier. They’re up 25 percent from a decade earlier.

Country Crock’s latest illegal nomenclature recalls the launch of its “plant-based butter” in 2019. That’s also a misnomer, given that statute specifies that butter can’t be plant-based. The name for such a product is “margarine,” “spread,” etc. But again, what can you expect from a company whose identity is based, from the use of the verb “churn” (verb: “To agitate or turn (milk or cream) in a machine in order to produce butter.”) to its self-proclaimed “creamy, buttery” taste, from associating itself with dairy?

Probably not much. But we can expect more from our government, which for decades has ignored willful attempts to mislead consumers from plant-based imposters.

We have high hopes, that in the name of consumer transparency and support for foods that are whole, natural and honest about what they are, that FDA finally may act in favor of accurate labeling and enforce the law this time, after decades of little positive action. In the meantime, we’ll celebrate butter’s continued success — and call out the crocks for what they are.

American Butter Institute Takes Aim at Country Crock

Posted on by Theresa Sweeney

The American Butter Institute, an organization managed and staffed by NMPF, asked the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to take action against Country Crock’s “dairy free salted butter” in a complaint sent June 25, asserting that the product’s label violates federal regulations.

The plant-based spread’s front label, in bold letters, describes itself as a form of butter, although federal standards of identity, along with legislation passed by Congress, defines butter as a product made from milk. In reality – and as admitted in the much smaller font on the package label – the Country Crock products describe themselves as “79% plant-based oil spreads.”

“Country Crock is attempting to leverage the premium perception of real dairy butter maintained by consumers,” said Christopher Galen, executive director of ABI. “The manufacturer is clearly trying to confuse the consumer about what this product is: an ultra-processed seed oil concoction. This product may indeed be a crock from the country, but it’s certainly not butter.”

Galen said that as margarine and vegetable oil spreads have declined in sales, companies are seeking to capitalize on butter’s resurgent popularity by misappropriating the term “butter” and applying it to products that clearly do not meet butter’s federal standard of identity. Butter manufacturers have to follow federal labeling standards, but the proliferation of fake butters is eroding the integrity of the marketplace, he said.

The ABI letter was sent today to Claudine Kavanaugh, Director of the FDA’s Office of Nutrition and Food Labeling. The National Milk Producers Federation raised a similar objection to Country Crock in 2019, when the company introduced a “plant-based butter.”