Image Courtesy of Trader Joe's
Trader Joe’s on a recent podcast explored how it comes up with many of the playful names of its private label products.
Hosts Tara Miller, the grocer's president of marketing, and Matt Sloan, VP of culture and innovation, said the use of quirky names, such as This Strawberry Walks Into A Bar for a cereal bar, is because the grocer aims to make the Trader Joe’s experience “fun.”
Sloan said, “Essentially, we believe that grocery shopping can be fun, that it does not have to be a chore. And when you bring the things that you buy from your Trader Joe's home, we'd love to extend that experience to your cupboard, to your freezer. So maybe you open the pantry, and you see that This Strawberry Walks Into A Bar. That's on purpose.”
Miller said This Strawberry Walks Into A Bar, part of Trader Joe’s mix for a while, is a no-frills strawberry-filled cereal bar so she felt the grocer’s private-label developers saw an opportunity to reframe the name of the cereal bar with the opening of a joke -- rather than just call it “strawberry cereal bar.”
She said, “I think the thinking internally was let's make it sound like fun, because it is fun, and it's different than saying, 'I want a strawberry cereal bar.' It's like, ‘I want This Strawberry Walks Into A Bar.’”
The phrasing led to similar adventurous names for other products, such as This Apple Walks Into A Bar cereal bar and These Sprinkles Walk Into A Cookie sandwich cookie.
Trader Joe's Experiments With Fun in its Private Label Lineup
Miller noted some private label names used by Trader Joe’s are “very straightforward,” although colorfully descriptive, such as Cauliflower Gnocchi, Mandarin Orange Chicken, and Chili & Lime Flavored Rolled Corn Tortilla Chips.
But many are puns or a play on words. Its chocolate bars are called Pound Plus because they’re slightly over a pound. Avocado's Number Guacamole calls out the number of avocados in the product. Midnight Moo, Trader Joe's version of chocolate syrup, references the popularity of chocolate milk as a midnight snack.
Some names are simply Trader Joe’s private label team “having a bit of fun,” according to Sloan -- such as Unexpected Cheddar Cheese Spread, Synergistically Seasoned Popcorn, and Hold the Cone! Ice Cream Cones.
He concluded, “If putting a fun name or even a really strangely long descriptive name of a product on the package helps you find a little bit of fun in your grocery shopping experience, we're all for that.”
Smuckers in mid-October filed a lawsuit against Trader Joe’s, alleging the grocer’s Crustless Peanut Butter & Strawberry Jam Sandwiches infringed on the trademarks of its Uncrustables frozen sandwiches.
The lawsuit pertained to the product’s similar make-up rather than the name, although some of Trader Joe’s names are similar to national labels, such Joe's O's versus Cheerios. Costco this year was similarly sued by Lululemon, and Aldi by Mondelēz International, over alleged copycats as private labels have been seeing accelerated growth amid inflationary pressures.