Royal Fruit Flavored Gelatin

“You sense the difference in the very first whiff—redolent of sun-sweetened fruits in a summer garden. You know at once that never before have you bought anything like this,” reads an ad for Royal Gelatin, footnote introduced in 1924 footnote by baking powder giant the Royal Baking Powder Company.

Available in strawberry, raspberry, cherry, orange, and lemon varieties, the product used real fruit juices for flavor—a detail that was heavily emphasized in its packaging and advertisements, with myriad depictions of housewives taking hearty sniffs of the package. This was a direct challenge to Jell-O, which dominated the gelatin dessert market but used artificial flavorings.

Royal Gelatin was an immediate success footnote and would indeed become one of Jell-O’s most formidable competitors. In the decades following, each company would unleash a slew of magazine advertisements, recipe booklets, radio and television sponsorships, and promotional tie-ins, all to earn the favor of America's sweet tooth.