When Cohen E. Williams, a successful pickle salesman, bought the Royal Flour Mill in Nashville, Tenn., in 1944, he began to spin a little marketing magic.
Williams promptly renamed the company Martha White Foods, to capitalize on the popularity of the flagship flour product and set the stage for expansion into cornmeal, mixes and other staples marketed for home baking.
As
a fan of country music, Williams built a relationship with 50,000-watt WSM
Radio (650 AM). He reportedly invested $25 a week, purchasing a 15-minute
segment that aired daily at 5:45 a.m.
The show was named “Martha White Biscuit and Cornbread Time” and featured live performances as well as commercials for Martha White products during a time slot when Southern families were waking up to bake biscuits.
The show was hosted by Milton Estes, who called himself “the Old Flour Peddler,” who performed with his band, the Musical Millers.
“Williams’ new slogan, ‘Goodness Gracious, It’s Good,’ made Martha White a household name,” wrote Sasha Kay Dunavant of Gabriel Communications.
“Two things that certainly fit together were country cooking and country music, and more of Martha White is exactly what fans wanted,” Dunavant said.
“In 1948, Martha White began sponsoring The Grand Ole Opry and continues to do so, making it one of the longest running radio sponsorships” in American history.
The jingle “You Bake Right with Martha White” was written by Nashville songwriter Pat Twitty in 1953 and performed by the virtually unknown bluegrass duo of Lester Flatt (left) and Earl Scruggs (right).
They were hired to barnstorm the South with the
Martha White Bluegrass Express, a music show that toured local festivals while
promoting Martha White flour and meal.
With biscuits and cornbread painted on their bus, Flatt & Scruggs became known as the “World’s Greatest Flour Peddlers” through local concerts and their performances on radio and television programs sponsored by Martha White.
Flatt & Scruggs and the Foggy Mountain Boys became bluegrass legends and country music hall of famers. They won a Grammy for the instrumental “Foggy Mountain Breakdown.”
The group also had a hit with “The Legend of Jed Clampett” (written
by Paul Henning), the theme song for the weekly comedy TV series “The Beverly
Hillbillies,” which aired from 1962-71.
After
Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs went their separate ways in 1969, Martha White
brought on popular country music vocalist Tennessee Ernie Ford as the company’s
spokesperson. He made guest appearances on the Grand Ole Opry and performed
private concerts for Martha White customers, deeming the products “pea-pickin’
good!”
One
of Ford’s last performances was in 1988 in honor of the Martha White brand’s
40th anniversary as a Grand Ole Opry sponsor. He received a rousing standing
ovation.
Although ownership of the Martha White brand started to ping-pong in 1975, following a merger with Beatrice Foods, the ties to country and bluegrass music have remained firmly in place.
Martha
White was affiliated with the concert tours of Alison Krauss and Union Station
in the 1990s, and the Martha White Bluegrass Express took to the road again in
2000 with a new artist on board, Rhonda Vincent, along with her band, The Rage.
This relationship is still intact, and the Martha White “theme song” is part of the repertoire.
Vincent’s 2026 tour includes concerts in North Carolina at venues
in Wilson, Cherokee, Manteo and Liberty.
The current owner of the Martha White brand is the Hometown Food Company, a unit of Brynwood Partners, a private equity investment firm headquartered in Greenwich, Conn. Other brands within the Hometown Food group include Pillsbury, Hungry Jack, White Lily, Arrowhead Mills and Birch Benders.
Country artist Brad Paisley refers to Martha White baking mixes in his 2012 song “Southern Comfort Zone.” In the song, which celebrates Southern culture, Paisley sings:
“You
have fed me, you have saved me, Billy Graham and Martha White.”
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