Editing Breakfast cereal (section)

==History==
{{Anchor|History of ready-to-eat (RTE) cold cereal|Ready-to-eat (RTE)}}<!-- PLEASE DO NOT REMOVE this anchor to avoid breaking internal links -->

===Early developments===
The first cold breakfast cereal, [[Granula]] (not to be confused with [[granola]]), was invented in the United States in 1863 by [[James Caleb Jackson]], operator of Our Home on the Hillside which was later replaced by the [[Jackson Sanatorium]] in [[Dansville, Livingston County, New York|Dansville, New York]]. The cereal never became popular, due to the inconvenient necessity of tenderizing the heavy bran and graham nuggets{{clarify|date=February 2025}} by soaking them overnight.<ref>{{cite web|title=Breakfast Cereal Beginnings|publisher=CyberPalate LLC|url=http://www.cuisinenet.com/digest/breakfast/cereal.shtml|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110624075408/http://www.cuisinenet.com/digest/breakfast/cereal.shtml|archive-date=24 June 2011}}</ref><ref name="Food and Nutrition">{{cite book|title=Food and Nutrition / Editorial Advisers, Dayle Hayes, Rachel Laudan, Volume 2|publisher=Marshall Cavendish|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=sIQQ6plTd6QC&pg=PA191 |isbn=9780761478218|year=2009}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=Firsts: Origins of Everyday Things That Changed the World|publisher=Penguin|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OXT0MyOjhnIC&pg=PT35 |isbn=9781101159460|date=6 October 2009}}</ref>

George H. Hoyt created [[Wheatena]] circa 1879, during an era when retailers would typically buy cereal (the most popular being cracked [[wheat]], [[oatmeal]], and [[cerealine]]) in barrel lots, and scoop it out to sell by the pound to customers. Hoyt, who had found a distinctive process of preparing wheat for cereal, sold his cereal in boxes, offering consumers a more sanitary and consumer-friendly option.<ref name="century">[http://www.homestatfarm.com/MemoryLane/ACenturyofWheatena/tabid/3012/Default.aspx "A Century of Wheatena"], HomeStatFarm.com</ref><ref>[http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?ammem/cool:@field(DOCID+@lit(lg0573)) "The Golden Heart of the Wheat"] chapter, [http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/D?coolbib:1:./temp/~ammem_WqKP:: ''The Story of a Pantry Shelf: An Outline History of Grocery Specialties'' (Butterick Publishing, New York, c. 1925], pp. 219–21. [https://web.archive.org/web/20101205160541/http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?ammem%2Fcool%3A%40field%28DOCID+%40lit%28lg0573%29%29 WebCitation archive].</ref>

===Kellogg and Battle Creek, Michigan===
[[File:AdvertisementKelloggsToastedCornFlakesMotherGuess1910.jpg|thumb|upright|1910 Kellogg's Corn Flakes advertisement]]
Packaged breakfast cereals were considerably more convenient than a product that had to be cooked, and as a result of this convenience (and clever marketing), they became popular. [[Battle Creek, Michigan]], was a center both of the [[Seventh-day Adventist Church]] and of innovation in the ready-to-eat cereal industry, and indeed, the church had a substantial impact on the development of cereal goods through the person of [[John Harvey Kellogg]] (1851–1943). Son of an Adventist factory owner in Battle Creek, Kellogg was encouraged by his church to train in medicine at [[Bellevue Hospital Medical College]] in New York City in 1875. After graduating, he became medical superintendent at the [[Battle Creek Sanitarium|Western Health Reform Institute]] in Battle Creek, established in 1866 by the Adventists to offer their natural remedies for illness.  Many wealthy industrialists came to Kellogg's sanitarium for recuperation and rejuvenation.

In Battle Creek sanitarium guests found fresh air, exercise, rest, [[hydrotherapy]], a strict vegetarian diet, and abstinence from alcohol, tobacco, coffee, and tea. (They were accustomed to breakfasts of ham, eggs, sausages, fried potatoes, hot biscuits, hotcakes (pancakes), and coffee.) To supplement the center's vegetarian regimen, Kellogg experimented with granola. Soon afterwards he began to experiment with wheat, resulting in a lighter, flakier product. In 1891 he acquired a patent and then in 1895 he launched the [[Corn flakes|Cornflakes]] brand, which overnight captured a national market. Soon there were forty rival manufacturers in the Battle Creek area. His brother [[William K. Kellogg]] (1860–1951) worked for him for many years until, in 1906, he broke away, bought the rights to Cornflakes, and set up the Kellogg Toasted Corn Flake Company. William Kellogg discarded the health food concept, opting for heavy advertising and commercial taste appeal. Later, his signature on every package became the company trademark.<ref>Horace B. Powell, ''The Original Has This Signature – W. K. Kellogg'' (1956)</ref><ref>{{cite journal | vauthors = Hotchkiss R | year = 1995 | title = Kelloggs of Battle Creek | journal = American History | volume = 29 | issue = 6| pages = 62–66 }}</ref><ref name=atlantic2016>{{Cite web|url=https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/06/how-marketers-invented-the-modern-version-of-breakfast/487130/|title=Why Cereal Has Such Aggressive Marketing|last2=Priceonomics|first1=Alex|last1=Mayyasi|date=16 June 2016|website=The Atlantic|language=en-US|access-date=26 January 2020}}</ref>

===Charles W. Post===

The second major innovator in the cereal industry was [[Charles W. Post]], a salesman who was admitted to Kellogg's sanitarium as a patient in the late 1800s. While there, he grew deeply impressed with their all-grain diet. Upon his release, he began experimenting with grain products, beginning with an all-grain coffee substitute called Postum. In 1897 (or 1898) he introduced [[Grape-nuts]], the concentrated cereal with a nutty flavor (containing neither grapes nor nuts). Good business sense, determination, and powerful advertising produced a multimillion-dollar fortune for Post in a few years.  After his death, his company acquired the [[Jell-O]] company in 1925, [[Baker's Chocolate]] in 1927, Maxwell House coffee in 1928, and Birdseye frozen foods in 1929. In 1929, the company changed its name to [[General Foods]]. In 1985, [[Philip Morris Tobacco Company]] bought General Foods for $5.6 billion (equivalent to ${{inflation|US|5.6|1985|r=1|fmt=c}} billion today) and merged it with its Kraft division.<ref>Peyton Paxson, "Charles William Post: The Mass Marketing of Health and Welfare". PhD Dissertation Boston U. 1993. 443 pp. DAI 1993 54(3): 981–982-A. DA9319980</ref> Because of [[Kellogg Company|Kellogg]] and [[Post Foods|Post]], the city of [[Battle Creek, Michigan]], is nicknamed the "Cereal Capital of the World".<ref>[http://www.roadsideamerica.com/sights/sightstory.php?tip_AttrId=%3D13038 "Cereal City USA – Closed, Battle Creek, Michigan"], RoadsideAmerica.com</ref>

===Muesli===
{{Main|Muesli}}
Muesli is a breakfast cereal based on uncooked [[rolled oats]], fruit, and nuts. It was developed around 1900 by the Swiss physician [[Maximilian Bircher-Benner]] for patients in his hospital.<ref>J.A. Kurmann, et al.: Encyclopedia of Fermented Fresh Milk Products: an international inventory of fermented milk, cream, buttermilk, whey, and related products. Springer Verlag, 1992. p. 75: Bircher Muesli.</ref> It is available in a [[Fast moving consumer goods|packaged]] dry form such as [[Alpen (food)|Alpen]] or [[Familia (food)|Familia]] Swiss Müesli, or it can be made fresh.

===United Kingdom===

In 1902, [[Force (cereal)|Force]] wheat flakes became the first ready-to-eat breakfast cereal introduced into the [[United Kingdom]].  The cereal, and the Sunny Jim character, achieved wide success in Britain, at its peak in 1930 selling 12.5 million packages in one year.

===National advertising===

Kellogg began the breakfast cereal marketing and introduced the first in-box prize in the early 1900s.<ref name="nyt2016">{{cite news |last1=Severson |first1=Kim |title=A Short History of Cereal |url=https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/02/22/dining/history-of-cereal.html |access-date=9 February 2020 |work=The New York Times |date=22 February 2016}}</ref> Quaker Oats entered the market with Puffed Rice and Wheat Berries it had introduced at the [[Louisiana Purchase Exposition|1904 World Fair]], with raw grains shot with hot compressed air from tubes, popping up to many times their size.<ref name="cruikshank">{{cite book |last1=Cruikshank |first1=Jeffrey L. |last2=Schultz |first2=Arthur W. |title=The man who sold America : the amazing (but true!) story of Albert D. Lasker and the creation of the advertising century |date=2010 |publisher=Harvard Business Press |isbn=9781422161777 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/manwhosoldameric0000crui/page/102 102]–104 |url=https://archive.org/details/manwhosoldameric0000crui |url-access=registration |access-date=9 February 2020}}</ref> They were marketed as a revolution in food science.<ref name="nyt2016"/> In the 1920s, national advertising in magazines and radio broadcasts played a key role in the emergence of the fourth big cereal manufacturer, [[General Mills]]. In 1921, [[James Ford Bell]], president of a Minneapolis wheat milling firm, began experimenting with rolled wheat flakes. After tempering, steaming, cracking wheat, and processing it with syrup, sugar, and salt, it was prepared in a pressure cooker for rolling and then dried in an electric oven. By 1925, [[Wheaties]] had become the "Breakfast of Champions". In 1928, four milling companies consolidated as the General Mills Company in Minneapolis. The new firm expanded packaged food sales with heavy advertising, including sponsorship of radio programs such as "[[Skippy (comic strip)|Skippy]]", "[[Jack Armstrong, the All-American Boy|Jack Armstrong, The All-American Boy]]", and baseball games. [[Jack Dempsey]], [[Johnny Weissmuller]], and others verified the "Breakfast of Champions" slogan. By 1941 Wheaties had won 12% percent of the cereal market. Experiments with the puffing process produced [[Kix (cereal)|Kix]], a puffed corn cereal, and [[Cheerios]], a puffed oats cereal. Further product innovation and diversification brought total General Mills sales to over $500 million annually (18% in packaged foods) by the early 1950s.<ref>Tom Forsythe, et al. ''General Mills: 75 Years of Innovation, Invention, Food & Fun'' (2003)</ref><ref>James Gray, ''Business Without Boundary: The Story of General Mills'' (1954)</ref> In 1944 General Foods launched a marketing campaign for Grape Nuts, focusing on nutritional importance of breakfast.<ref name=atlantic2016/>

===Sugar cereals===

[[File:Froot-Loops-Cereal-Bowl.jpg|thumb|right|Breakfast cereals primarily marketed to children, such as [[Froot Loops]], are commonly brightly colored and high in sugar.]]

After [[World War II]], the big breakfast cereal companies—now including [[General Mills]], who entered the market in 1924 with [[Wheaties]]—increasingly started to target children. The flour was refined to remove fiber, which at the time was considered to undermine digestion and absorption of nutrients, and [[sugar]] was added to improve the flavor for children. The new breakfast cereals began to look starkly different from their ancestors. Ranger Joe, the first pre-sweetened breakfast cereal of sugar-coated puffed wheat or rice, was introduced in the US in 1939.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=g_5DAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA287|title=Candy: A Century of Panic and Pleasure|last=Kawash|first=Samira|date=2013-10-15|publisher=Macmillan|isbn=9780865477568|pages=287–289 and color plate #15}}</ref> [[Kellogg's]] [[Honey Smacks|Sugar Smacks]], created in 1953, had 56% sugar by weight.<ref>[http://www.karlloren.com/diet/p35.htm Percentage Of Sugar In Common Foods] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130928074852/http://www.karlloren.com/diet/p35.htm |date=28 September 2013 }}</ref> Different mascots were introduced, such as the [[Rice Krispies]] elves<ref>[https://archive.org/details/Breakfas1939 "Breakfast Pals" (1939)], Prelinger Archives; producer Cartoon Films, Ltd; sponsor Kellogg (W.K.) Co.</ref> and later pop icons like [[Tony the Tiger]] and the [[Trix Rabbit]].

A January 2025 study in the [[American Journal of Preventive Medicine]] examined cereal purchases from 77,000 U.S. households over nine years alongside Nielsen ratings data on advertising exposure. The study found that ads targeting adults had negligible impact, while those aimed at children strongly correlated with increased purchases of sugary cereals in households with kids. Nine cereals, each with 9 to 12 grams of sugar per serving, dominated the market, accounting for 41% of total cereal bought.<ref>{{cite web | last=Godoy | first=Maria | title=Families buy more sugary cereal if advertising targets kids, not adults | website=NPR | date=2025-02-04 | url=https://www.npr.org/sections/shots-health-news/2025/02/04/nx-s1-5285413/cereal-sugar-kids-advertising-health | access-date=2025-02-05}}</ref>

=== Granola ===
{{Main|granola}}
In the 1960s, the modern version of [[granola]] was invented and popularized. It evolved from a product called [[Granula]] (similar to [[Grape-Nuts|Grape Nuts]]) to the recognizable modern form involving at a minimum: sweetened toasted oats, but also possibly: dried fruit, puffed rice, nuts or chocolate.

===Modern cereal===

Over 2016 to 2017, Americans purchased 3.1 billion boxes of cereal, mostly as [[Convenience food|ready to eat]] cold cereal.<ref name="hyslop">{{cite web | title=Cold cereals USA: The Top 10 brands in the first half of 2017 | publisher=Bakeryandsnacks.com, William Reed Media Ltd|author=Gill Hyslop | date=3 August 2017 | url=https://www.bakeryandsnacks.com/Article/2017/08/03/Cold-cereals-USA-The-Top-10-brands-in-the-first-half-of-2017 | access-date=22 February 2019}}</ref> In a $9.8 billion cereal market, cold cereal purchases were 88% of the total (12% for hot cereals), with the overall cereal market declining due to reduced consumption of [[sugar]] and [[dairy product]]s.<ref name=hyslop/> [[Kellogg's]] and [[General Mills]] each had 30% of the [[market share]] for cold cereals. [[Honey Nut Cheerios]] was the leading cold cereal.<ref name=hyslop/>