> a peanut shortage prompted Delta, then America’s fourth-largest airline, to seek an alternative onboard snack
I never knew this was the reason. I had assumed that airlines stopped serving peanuts as an accomodation to the increasing number of people with peanut allergies.
I'd read that there are a few snack items resistant to GLP-1 induced food aversions, when I was on a GLP-1, Biscoff cookies felt like one of them. I may have an Amazon scheduled delivery of Biscoff, which every month, I intend to cancel, and somehow forget to follow through.
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c0rruptbytes
Claire Saffitz makes cinnamon rolls with these cookies as the inner cinnamon filling, they’re so good with the spice
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sam1714
During the heights of COVID, the bargain store by me had boxes of trays of American Airlines' Biscoff. They were clearly optimized for weight: packaged in a super lightweight plastic tray with shrink wrap so thin it already had holes in it.
They apparently had enough getting stale to offload them to a liquidator.
Wow. Seems people do love it. My thought was always there could be no cheaper or worse snack that airlines can offer
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Exoristos
Soon after these became ubiquitous in grocery stores, the manufacturer stopped using butter. I don't buy them anymore.
mattgoupil
I first ran into speculoos in the south of France where they ground up and in all sorts of things, especially cheesecake crust. All of a sudden I saw "speculoos" every where. How it jumped from Belgium to Nice escapes me.
rootusrootus
Once in a while we pick up a pack of these from Costco, when we haven't flown in a while. They're pretty sweet, so we don't get them too often, but once in a while as a treat.
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HumblyTossed
Too sweet. Much would rather p-nuts.
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johnnyApplePRNG
Title makes it sound like Biscoff was created by an airline or something...
The bakery has been around since 1932, FYI.
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fotta
I have been known to inhale entire costco sized sleeves of biscoffs
I don't look at the nutrition facts
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urbandw311er
This article is kind of one-sided – it consistently makes claims and then has to admit, in brackets, that Lotus disputes them.
el_don_almighty
I love these cookies
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voooduuuuu
Just like login session cookies.
CodeWriter23
In-flight internet sucks? Have a cookie.
purpleidea
They were (and are) a huge mistake. Not everyone knows that these Biscoff cookies contain cinnamon! A large number of people dislike cinnamon, and most sources of it contain heavy metals. There's also some early research to show that it causes cancer, although the quantities in one cookie are likely not going to hurt you as much as the radiation from the plane you're on.
Hope they get rid of these, it's always a hard pass for me, and I've seen so many others just skip or bin them after one bit.
HoldOnAMinute
They are temporary. They have a way of disappearing into my belly.
_doctor_love
Dunking these in coffee is super clutch
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burningChrome
And now with their popularity, they're almost everywhere now. Mcdonald's, Krispy Kreme, Cinnabon, Auntie Anne's have all had Biscoff partnered products.
Kind of cool to the explosion of popularity and them taking advantage and partnering with other brands to expand their markets.
sammycdubs
#1 reason to fly delta tbh
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t1234s
pairs well with a coffee but with a gin and tonic pretzels are the way to go.
MC995
Honestly that's one of the few things I look forward to when flying these days, and a serious consideration on picking Delta if other factors are equal between airlines.
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thaumasiotes
In Hong Kong I've seen a gourmet cheesecake shop selling "Lotus Biscoff" flavored cheesecake, and supermarkets selling Biscoff butter (basically Nutella, but with Biscoff flavoring instead of chocolate).
I know the cookie mainly for being sold at Costco. I had no idea they were given out on flights.
The biggest question I've always had about them was whether the "Lotus" in their name is the same brand as the Chinese supermarket chain Lotus. I think it isn't?
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peter_d_sherman
>"But until 1986, when Delta Air Lines began serving them as a temporary replacement for peanuts, the cookie—typically something enjoyed with a cup of coffee in a Belgian café—was practically unknown in the US. Today, Biscoff is a global phenomenon, with its manufacturer Lotus Bakeries touting it as the world’s fifth-bestselling cookie."
How do you make your unknown product known?
You put it in front of as many people as you can!
In the above case, cookies in front of airline-passengers seemed to be the winning business formula, but this is only one example of a product meeting a market at a specific interface/connection point, with the Delta customers' drop-down in-flight tray tables being that "connection point".
In the study of business, this is one example (or subcase) of that much broader pattern...
Still, it's a pretty cool example! :-)
TheRealPomax
> traditional Belgian cookie speculaas
Pardon? You mean the traditional Belgian, Dutch, French, and German cookie? Because it's a cross-border (food) cultural good, it's not something invented by, or to this day cherished in, one specific country.
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ardit33
Does anyone voluntarily buys them? I find them barely eatable food.
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prmph
Aren't they supposed to be full of sugar? Each time I've been tempted to pick them up when shopping, one look at the ingredients and nutritional profile is enough to dissuade me. I guess trying them once in a while won't kill me, though.
Apparently, they are a brand of speculoos cookies, and this Wikipedia synopsis is eye opening:
> speculaas [speːkyˈlaːs] ⓘ refers to the more traditional variant, made with a mix of various spices, which is nowadays most popular in the Netherlands; speculoos [speːkyˈloːs] ⓘ refers to a Belgian variant that omits the traditional spices in favour of caramelized sugar for flavour, and which is nowadays the most common variant in Belgium and worldwide
So the Belgians enshittified speculaas to create speculoos, pumping it full of sugar, and presented it to the world as something special.
> a peanut shortage prompted Delta, then America’s fourth-largest airline, to seek an alternative onboard snack
I never knew this was the reason. I had assumed that airlines stopped serving peanuts as an accomodation to the increasing number of people with peanut allergies.
Have you heard of Biscoff spread? It's kinda like peanut butter except, it's made out of cookies https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_BZsIY6PUPU (might not be sfw)
I'd read that there are a few snack items resistant to GLP-1 induced food aversions, when I was on a GLP-1, Biscoff cookies felt like one of them. I may have an Amazon scheduled delivery of Biscoff, which every month, I intend to cancel, and somehow forget to follow through.
Claire Saffitz makes cinnamon rolls with these cookies as the inner cinnamon filling, they’re so good with the spice
During the heights of COVID, the bargain store by me had boxes of trays of American Airlines' Biscoff. They were clearly optimized for weight: packaged in a super lightweight plastic tray with shrink wrap so thin it already had holes in it.
They apparently had enough getting stale to offload them to a liquidator.
Please, make sure you try these at least once in your life: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speculoos
As a Belgian I still dislike this new branding.
Wow. Seems people do love it. My thought was always there could be no cheaper or worse snack that airlines can offer
Soon after these became ubiquitous in grocery stores, the manufacturer stopped using butter. I don't buy them anymore.
I first ran into speculoos in the south of France where they ground up and in all sorts of things, especially cheesecake crust. All of a sudden I saw "speculoos" every where. How it jumped from Belgium to Nice escapes me.
Once in a while we pick up a pack of these from Costco, when we haven't flown in a while. They're pretty sweet, so we don't get them too often, but once in a while as a treat.
Too sweet. Much would rather p-nuts.
Title makes it sound like Biscoff was created by an airline or something...
The bakery has been around since 1932, FYI.
I have been known to inhale entire costco sized sleeves of biscoffs
I don't look at the nutrition facts
This article is kind of one-sided – it consistently makes claims and then has to admit, in brackets, that Lotus disputes them.
I love these cookies
Just like login session cookies.
In-flight internet sucks? Have a cookie.
They were (and are) a huge mistake. Not everyone knows that these Biscoff cookies contain cinnamon! A large number of people dislike cinnamon, and most sources of it contain heavy metals. There's also some early research to show that it causes cancer, although the quantities in one cookie are likely not going to hurt you as much as the radiation from the plane you're on.
Hope they get rid of these, it's always a hard pass for me, and I've seen so many others just skip or bin them after one bit.
They are temporary. They have a way of disappearing into my belly.
Dunking these in coffee is super clutch
And now with their popularity, they're almost everywhere now. Mcdonald's, Krispy Kreme, Cinnabon, Auntie Anne's have all had Biscoff partnered products.
Kind of cool to the explosion of popularity and them taking advantage and partnering with other brands to expand their markets.
#1 reason to fly delta tbh
pairs well with a coffee but with a gin and tonic pretzels are the way to go.
Honestly that's one of the few things I look forward to when flying these days, and a serious consideration on picking Delta if other factors are equal between airlines.
In Hong Kong I've seen a gourmet cheesecake shop selling "Lotus Biscoff" flavored cheesecake, and supermarkets selling Biscoff butter (basically Nutella, but with Biscoff flavoring instead of chocolate).
I know the cookie mainly for being sold at Costco. I had no idea they were given out on flights.
The biggest question I've always had about them was whether the "Lotus" in their name is the same brand as the Chinese supermarket chain Lotus. I think it isn't?
>"But until 1986, when Delta Air Lines began serving them as a temporary replacement for peanuts, the cookie—typically something enjoyed with a cup of coffee in a Belgian café—was practically unknown in the US. Today, Biscoff is a global phenomenon, with its manufacturer Lotus Bakeries touting it as the world’s fifth-bestselling cookie."
How do you make your unknown product known?
You put it in front of as many people as you can!
In the above case, cookies in front of airline-passengers seemed to be the winning business formula, but this is only one example of a product meeting a market at a specific interface/connection point, with the Delta customers' drop-down in-flight tray tables being that "connection point".
In the study of business, this is one example (or subcase) of that much broader pattern...
Still, it's a pretty cool example! :-)
> traditional Belgian cookie speculaas
Pardon? You mean the traditional Belgian, Dutch, French, and German cookie? Because it's a cross-border (food) cultural good, it's not something invented by, or to this day cherished in, one specific country.
Does anyone voluntarily buys them? I find them barely eatable food.
Aren't they supposed to be full of sugar? Each time I've been tempted to pick them up when shopping, one look at the ingredients and nutritional profile is enough to dissuade me. I guess trying them once in a while won't kill me, though.
Apparently, they are a brand of speculoos cookies, and this Wikipedia synopsis is eye opening:
> speculaas [speːkyˈlaːs] ⓘ refers to the more traditional variant, made with a mix of various spices, which is nowadays most popular in the Netherlands; speculoos [speːkyˈloːs] ⓘ refers to a Belgian variant that omits the traditional spices in favour of caramelized sugar for flavour, and which is nowadays the most common variant in Belgium and worldwide
So the Belgians enshittified speculaas to create speculoos, pumping it full of sugar, and presented it to the world as something special.