Early origins
In 1884, Joel Cheek moved to Nashville and met Roger Nolley Smith, a British coffee broker. He was said to be able to tell the origin of a coffee simply by smelling the green beans. Over the next few years, the two worked on finding the perfect blend. In 1892, Cheek approached the food buyer for the Maxwell House Hotel and gave him 20 pounds of his special blend for free. After a few days, the coffee was gone, and the hotel returned to using its usual brand. But after hearing complaints from patrons and others who liked Cheek's coffee better, the hotel bought Cheek's blend exclusively. After six months, the hotel agreed to allow Cheek to name his coffee after his first big sale.[7]
Inspired by his success, Cheek resigned from his job as a coffee broker and, with partner Maxwell Colbourne, formed a wholesale grocery distributor known as the "Nashville Coffee and Manufacturing Company". They specialized in coffee, with Maxwell House Coffee, as it came to be known, as the central brand. Later, the Nashville Coffee and Manufacturing Company was renamed as the "Cheek-Neal Coffee Company". Over the next several years, the Maxwell House Coffee brand became a well-respected name that set it apart from the competition.[8]
"Good to the last drop"
In 1915, Cheek-Neal began using a "Good to the last drop" slogan to advertise their Maxwell House Coffee.[4] For several years, the ads made no claim of Theodore Roosevelt being the originator of the phrase.[2] The company was then sold to General Foods which took over the Maxwell House brand in 1925. By the 1930s, the company was running advertisements that claimed that the former president had taken a sip of Maxwell House Coffee on a visit to Andrew Jackson's estate, The Hermitage, near Nashville on October 21, 1907, and when served the coffee, he proclaimed it to be "good to the last drop".[9] During this time, Coca-Cola also used the slogan "Good to the last drop".[10] Later, Maxwell House distanced itself from that 1930s advertising claim, admitting that the slogan was written by Clifford Spiller, former president of General Foods Corporation, and did not come from a Roosevelt remark overheard by Cheek-Neal. The phrase remains a registered trademark of the product and appears on its logo.
The veracity of the Roosevelt connection to the phrase has never been historically established. In the local press coverage of Roosevelt's October 21 visit, a story concerning Roosevelt and the cup of coffee he drank features a quote that does not resemble the slogan.[9] He is quoted as saying: "This is the kind of stuff I like to drink, by George, when I hunt bears." The Maxwell House Company claimed in its advertising that the Roosevelt story was true. In 2009, Maxwell House ran a commercial featuring Roosevelt repriser Joe Wiegand, who tells the "Last Drop" story.[11]
Expansion of the product line
In 1942 during World War II, General Foods Corporation, successor to the Postum Company established by Charles William Post, contracted to supply instant coffee to the U.S. armed forces. Beginning in the fall of 1945, this product, which by that time had come to be branded as Maxwell House Instant Coffee, entered test markets in the eastern U.S.; it began national distribution the following year
The Yuban brand (sometimes Yule brand) was John Arbuckle's name for his personal mix of fresh coffees for Christmas gifts.[12][13][14] In 1935, Arbuckle Brothers Company, the first merchant to sell packaged coffee, was merged with Maxwell House, later, General Foods.[15]
Decaffeinated coffee
General Foods marketed decaffeinated coffee under various brand names such as Sanka from c. 1927, and Brim and Maxim, the latter a freeze-dried instant coffee which is not decaffeinated, from the 1950s. But it refrained from selling Maxwell House-labeled decaffeinated coffee products until 1983, when it introduced ground Maxwell House Decaffeinated into East Coast markets.
"General Foods... through its Maxwell House division, entered 1984 with the West Coast introduction of Yuban ground decaffeinated coffee, followed by the national rollout of Maxwell House decaffeinated[21]"
At the same time, it introduced a decaffeinated version of its long-established, lighter-tasting Yuban brand on the West Coast. Maxwell House Instant Decaffeinated Coffee came to store shelves in 1985. A further modification of the decaf theme, Maxwell House Lite, a reduced-caffeine blend, was introduced nationally in 1992 by Kraft General Foods and in its instant form the following year.
