Creator Of One Of The World's Most Beloved Breakfast Treats Has Died

William Post, one of the inventors of an iconic breakfast staple thats become an anytime snack with $1 billion in U.S. annual sales, has died. 

He was 96. 

Post, known to friends as Bill, helped create the Pop-Tart, an idea he said most people couldnt get their heads around at the time.  

There were so many naysayers, Post told News Channel 3 in Kalamazoo, Michigan, in 2021. Some of my good friends would say, I dont know Bill. They would tell us its not such a good idea.

Post had been plant manager at Hekman Biscuit Company, a regional baker that was part of the company that would become Keebler, when Kelloggs came calling with the idea in 1964, his obituary said . 

Post told News Channel 3 that he was used to making a single sheet of dough, like for a cracker. The challenge was adding a second layer with that delicious filling in the middle. 

To get that done, I had to break every rule in the book, he said in a video produced by Kellanova , the current corporate name of Kelloggs. 

Within four weeks, we had a handmade sample, he told Fox 17 in Grand Rapids in 2022. Within four months, we had a product that went to test market. They found out that kids really liked them.

He said in the Kellanova video that a handmade test run of 10,000 samples of strawberry, blueberry, apple currant and brown sugar cinnamon sold out quickly locally. They scaled up to 45,000 cases of each flavor to test in Cleveland, and those sold out too. 

Those just blew off the shelves, Post told Fox 17 . Kelloggs ran a big-page ad: Oops! We goofed! Sorry, we ran out of Pop-Tarts. From then on, weve been running ever since. 

CNBC said in October that Pop-Tarts had annual sales of about $1 billion in the United States alone. 

But Post didnt need to see the sales to know it would be a success. 

He found out at home first, when he saw his kids couldnt get enough.

I used to bring a lot of stuff home, samples youd run, and theyd turn up their noses, they didnt like this or that, he told The Associated Press in 2003 . But they used to ask me, Bring those fruit scones home. Thats what we called them at first, internally. Fruit scones. Bring some of those home, will you, Dad?

Pop-Tarts were unfrosted initially. The icing was added a few years later, and presented a new challenge including naysayers who worried the sweet topping would melt in toasters, making a gooey mess. 

He told News Channel 3 it took him a single day to perfect the formula. 

Post told News Channel 3 that his favorite flavor was one of the originals: strawberry. Also he eats them cold.  

According to Posts obituary, he wouldnt claim credit for creating the morning staple. 

Bill would say, I assembled an amazing team that developed Kelloggs concept of a shelf-stable toaster pastry into a fine product that we could bring to market in the span of just four months, the obit states. 

Post was married for 72 years to Florence Post, who died in 2020. 

Jerry Seinfeld is currently working on a movie about the morning treat. Seinfeld directs, co-writes and stars in Unfrosted: The Pop-Tart Story, which hits Netflix in May. 

In the video for Kellanova, viewers get a brief glimpse of Posts car.

License plate: POPTART.