Friday, November 20, 2009

Kraft Food & Family Is No Longer Free

I've been receiving Kraft Food & Family for several years now and have made many of their recipes, especially their dinners. Of course all of their foods call for Kraft products such as soups, salad dressings, cheese etc. No problem - just use whatever you have. I'm not loyal to many brands of foods. I buy what's inexpensive and if it sucks, I don't buy it again. End of story.

In the past couple of months, Kraft Food & Family has made a big marketing decision regarding their magazine and has opted to take it out of the "free" category and charge their customers for it. Evidently they felt they had a strong enough following to start a paying subscription. They probably do.

I've been considering for several months whether I'd become a paying customer to keep getting the magazine. I received their most recent November issue the other day and dutifully clipped all of the recipes I'd like to try. I thought this month would probably be my deciding factor. However, there weren't recipes I lusted after this issue.

I recently bought a subscription to Taste of Home, a magazine I truly love. Every single recipe in it that I've tried (with perhaps 2 exceptions) has turned out to be a winner. With KFF, I really never know if what I'm going to be putting on the table is even going to be palatable. And honestly, there have been times...sorry. I've discussed this with several friends who get KFF also and have had similar responses. Sometimes the recipes are good (hardly ever GREAT) and sometimes leftovers just get trashed. The up side is that they're fast, usually you have the ingredients on hand, and they're inexpensive to make. Most of the time also, they're kid friendly (and I guess to some people that is a lot).

The yearly subscription that they're offering me is only $6/year and if I hadn't already tried the magazine over the course of several years, I'd be willing to give it a go. However, if they're not making any other changes besides charging me for it, I guess I'm going to end my relationship with KFF and look forward to receiving my good and trusted (that never lets me down) Taste of Home.

Sorry Kraft Food & Family. I just don't love Italian dressing in my ravioli.

3 backward glances:

Rachel said...

I found out about the charge a couple of months ago. I was bummed, but moved on. I'm finding that cooks.com helps me find quick and easy recipes based on an ingredient search. So I can cook from the items I already have rather than buying specialty items. I decided to forgo cookbooks, the internet gives me a wider range and quicker search.

Amy said...

I knew you looked at that magazine Rachel. I'm glad you found a replacement for it though and hopefully the recipes you're finding are better! If I see any good ones in TOH, I'll pass them along!

Anita said...

I'm a year late reading this. I just found your blog from a myfatcure link. I too was bummed that they started charging. I didn't cave in though! I know it's only $6 but still I didn't think it was worth paying for it.