The Naxon Beanery, Crock-Pots, and “This Is Us”

It started with a tweet I sent out featuring an ad for the slow-cooking countertop cooking icon of the late 20th century, the Crock-Pot.

While I am familiar with this beloved kitchen fixture, I didn’t know much about it. It turns out the modern Crock-Pot used to be called something else.

Naxon Beanery All-Purpose Cooker

Slow-cooking food is an ancient practice. Its modern incarnation in the United States started after World War II when women began entering the workplace in greater numbers. They would start a slow cooking meal in the morning before they left for work and would have a ready-to-eat dinner when they got home.

A brilliant inventor named Irving Naxon, inspired by his mother’s tales of delicious cholent, looked at this trend and realized he could come up with a simpler countertop solution that could be safer and cooler to use in the summer months. On May 21, 1936, he applied for a patent for his slow cooker, and it was granted on January 23, 1940.

It would take a decade for Naxon Utilities Corporation to start to manufacture and market this slow cooker. This delay was probably due to Word War II.

When it finally did come to market it was known as the Naxon Beanery. It got that name because its stated purpose was the cooking of bean meal.

The Rival Company bought Naxon in 1970 when Irving decided to retire. The acquisition included Naxon’s 1940 patent for the Beanery.

The Crock-Pot

Rival would bring on inventor Robert Glen Martin to rework the Beanery. His mission, turn it into a device that could cook an entire meal.

He worked quickly and at the 1971 Chicago National Housewares Show, they unveiled this new cooker with a more Seventies look. It came in colors like Avocado Green and Harvest Gold. Most impoPot.

The Crock-Pot was a near-instant success. Packaged with a cookbook, that demonstrated its ease of use, the Crock-Pot really worked well for people who were embracing the trend of rebelling against processed foods. All these factors sent sales through the roof. Which went from $2 million in 1971 to a mind-boggling $93 million in 1975.

Slow Cooker sales in the United States continue to be strong and the Crock-Pot continues to sell well under its current owners Newell Brands.

A few years ago, Crock-Pots made the news again. Not because of a new design or cooking innovation, but because they featured prominently in a tragic turn on a popular TV show.

“This Is Us”

This Is Us is a TV drama that premiered on NBC on September 20, 2016. It is about a family and notably uses flashbacks in its storytelling to enhance the drama.

So what does this have to do with Crock-Pots?

Well on a January 2018 episode of the show, viewers were shocked to learn that popular character Jack Pearson, played by Milo Ventimiglia, dies in a fifaulty Crock-Pot.

It was an emotional moment and fans were freaking out. They were not the only ones. Crock-Pot took to Twitter for the first time to try to do some damage control. According to the New Yorker,

Crock-Pot, meanwhile, determined that it had no choice but to play along. A Crock-Pot spokesperson told me that the company launched its first-ever Twitter account “so we could comfort fans over the loss of Jack and, at the same time, share facts about safety.”

As it turns out, the old adage that there is no such thing as bad publicity turned out to be true. It also helped that “This Is Us” played along.

The end result?  According to Ad Age, “sales increased $300,892 in February.”