Celeste was once a staple in freezers nationwide. Now Conagra is ending the brand as it focuses on faster-growing, more profitable businesses, including Slim Jim and Healthy Choice.
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After nearly 60 years, Mama Celeste has made her last frozen pizza.
Conagra Brands is retiring a pioneering staple of American freezers, ending a run that began in 1962 when “Mama” Celeste Lizio and her husband, Anthony, closed their Chicago restaurant and started producing frozen pizzas and other Italian foods for local restaurants.
Quaker Oats bought the brand in 1969 and launched it in frozen-food aisles nationwide, with Celeste’s smiling face on the box and on television, where she was the longtime spokeswoman.
Conagra said the decision to discontinue Celeste is part of the company’s broader effort to shed underperforming products.
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“There are certain brands and categories where we simply just don’t see a future,” said John Brase, the company’s president and chief executive officer, during the company’s recent earnings call. “One early example is our decision to exit the Celeste frozen pizza business. While that action created a modest 15-basis-point headwind to first-quarter net sales, it allows us to redirect our resources toward brands and categories where we have greater scale and stronger growth potential.”
“Importantly,” he added, “we expect the decision to be accretive to margins going forward.”
Conagra Brands, one of the nation’s largest packaged-food companies, reported $2.6 billion in first-quarter net sales, down from $2.63 billion a year earlier. Adjusted earnings rose to 41 cents per share from 39 cents. The Chicago-based corporation reaffirmed its forecast for fiscal 2027 earnings of $1.40 to $1.50 per share while projecting an organic net-sales decline of 1 percent to 3 percent for the year.