The Honey Baked Ham Company facts for kids
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Honey Baked Ham Store
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| Private | |
| Founded | 1957 Detroit, Michigan, U.S. |
| Founder | Harry J. Hoenselaar |
| Headquarters |
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U.S.
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Number of locations
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492 (2020) |
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Key people
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Jim Dinkins, CEO |
| Products | Honey Baked bone in ham, Honey Baked Boneless Ham, and Honey Baked turkey breast and precooked meals. |
The Honey Baked Ham Company is a well-known food company. It sells delicious hams, turkey breasts, and other ready-to-eat meals. You can also find side dishes and desserts there. The company started in 1957 in Detroit, Michigan. Today, its main office is in Alpharetta, Georgia. As of 2020, there were 492 Honey Baked Ham stores across the United States.
Contents
How the Company Started
The Idea for Spiral Ham
In 1924, a man named Harry Hoenselaar had a great idea. He created a special machine to slice a bone-in ham in a spiral. This machine also smoked and cooked the ham perfectly. Harry said the idea for this unique spiral slicer came to him in a dream! He built his first machine using simple items. These included a car jack, a pie tin, a washing machine motor, and a knife.
Selling Hams in Detroit
In the 1930s, Harry started selling his honey-glazed hams. He sold them to drugstores in Detroit. He even taught the people working at the lunch counters how to slice the ham correctly. Later, he bought one of these drugstores for $500. With his special slicer and his love for Detroit, Harry officially started The HoneyBaked Ham Company in 1957.
Growing Across the Country
When the company began to grow, Harry wanted to expand it across the United States. He divided the country into four areas. He gave each of his four daughters one of these areas to manage. This helped the company spread its delicious products far and wide.
Today, Harry's granddaughter, Linda van Rees, leads the company. She moved the main office to Alpharetta in 2015. The Honey Baked Ham Company now has over 200 stores owned by the company. It also has more than 200 franchise locations. This means other people own and run those stores. You can also buy their products online. The Hoenselaar family still owns the company privately.
What People Say About Honey Baked Ham
Top Reviews and Awards
The Honey Baked Ham Company has received many good reviews. In October 2013, a magazine called Consumer Reports reviewed different hams. They said Honey Baked Ham was "clearly best of the bunch." This means it was the best one they tried.
In 2019, a writer for The New York Times, Kim Severson, praised Harry J. Hoenselaar. She called him "the father of spiral-cut ham." This shows how important his invention was to the food world.
