The ‘emergency food’ industry, which makes dehydrated and freeze-dried foods that can be stored for years, is trying to appeal to a new crowd: busy families looking for a quick meal. The Wall Street Journal taste-tested some of the prepackaged food on the market. Video/Photo: Rob Alcaraz/The Wall Street Journal 
 
 The “emergency-food” industry has long sold tubs of dehydrated fruit and freeze-dried beef stew to keep until disaster strikes. 
 
 The selling point is the food lasts for years. For companies, that is also the drawback. Customers can stock up once—a “one-and-done purchase,” said Greg Allison, vice president of marketing for Blue Chip Group Inc., which makes hundreds of different freeze-dried entrees. 
 
 So he and others in the business are asking, Why wait for Armageddon? 
 
 Thirty-day supply 
 
 With a new menu of gluten-free, organic meals, dehydrated Greek yogurt and fruit snacks, companies hope to draw a wider group of customers who will dig in well before doomsday. 
 
 “The zombie apocalypse isn’t going to happen,” said Kenny Larson, marketing coordinator for Mountain House, which is owned by OFD Foods Inc., an Albany, Ore., freeze-dried food maker that has fed campers and the U.S. military, “but you might get snowed in and not be able to go the grocery store.” 
 
 Devin Spratt, of Sunnyvale, Calif., said he discovered freeze-dried food while backpacking but now considers them an easy meal after a long day at his trucking startup. “They are not some gourmet, home-cooked meal,” said the 30-year-old mechanical engineer, “but they aren’t dry Cheerios.” 
 
 ENLARGE This $3,599 kit of dried foods can feed four people for a year. It includes such foods as dehydrated fruit and Beef Stroganoff. (Water isn’t included.) Photo: Blue Chip Group Inc. 
 
 For Shelia Winsett, freeze-dried food is a matter of taste. The 66-year-old retiree has replaced the potatoes and cream of mushroom soup in her pork-chop casserole with a pouch of Augason Farms cheesy broccoli rice mix from her emergency food stash. 
 
 “I believe we are going to go through some hard times and there will be no food,” said Ms. Winsett, who has a closet in her Parrish, Ala., home stacked with bins of freeze-dried meals. Meantime, she said, the broccoli-rice mix “makes a difference” in her son’s favorite casserole. 
 
 Disaster needn’t fall soon. The Salt Lake City-based Legacy Food Storage boasts meals with a 25-year shelf life. A best seller is the $285 34-pound sample pack that includes Italian pasta and a vegetarian version of chicken à la king. 
 
 To attract urbanites, companies have started selling small “pantry packs” and containers small enough to fit under bed. They want people to also use the food as “a quick meal for unexpected guests,” according to one product description, as much as for waiting out the hurricane or stocking the bunker. 
 
 “The Holy Grail for long-term, shelf-stable food is to become an everyday purchase,” said Mr. Allison of Blue Chip, whose Augason Farms brand is sold at Wal-Mart. WMT 0.63 % 
 
 His company is trying to branch out from the camping and bulk food sections to more mainstream food aisles. It is not an easy move. One prospect is Blue Chip’s new organic soup mixes, including butternut squash and tomato basil. 
 
 “You are dealing with the General Mills GIS 0.09 % of the world and the Pillsburys,” Mr. Allison said. “To get on those shelves is a very, very competitive space.” 
 
 Emergency Essentials LLC, of Orem, Utah, which started selling small packs of freeze-dried fruit, hopes to place them at store check-out lines, said Scotty Pectol, a company sales manager. 
 
 ENLARGE ‘Dried Egg Product’ is a popular purchase among customers prepping for disaster because it provides cheap protein. Photo: Blue Chip Group Inc. 
 
 The meals aren’t for everyone. Many are high in calories and sodium, useful when fighting for survival, the companies said; less so after a day at the office. 
 
 “Your stomach won’t be right if you eat them every day,” said a New York City employee of REI, a sports-and-camping store chain. The worker said he and his colleagues occasionally grab a freeze-dried backpacking meal for a quick lunch. They are tasty, he said, but in his experience trigger constipation. 
 
 Emergency-food companies have long relied on fear to help drive sales, with demand spiking for such panic-buying events as last year’s blood-moon lunar eclipse—rumored to be linked with global catastrophe. 
 
 Annual sales track the ebb and flow of American angst. The industry boomed after the recession, for example, company executives said. 
 
 ENLARGE Many emergency food kits come in large buckets meant to be stored for decades, such as this best-seller from Wise Company. Photo: Wise Company 
 
 Buyers generally lean toward the “fiscally conservative, politically independent or Republican,” said Phil Cox of Legacy Food. “The best thing that can happen for my business is Hillary Clinton winning the presidency.” 
 
 Despite the world’s troubles, freeze-dried foods—$300 million in a good year—remain a small fry in the more than half trillion-dollar U.S. food industry. 
 
 Angela Bailey is one new customer. To save money, Ms. Bailey, the co-owner of an appliance store in Killeen, Texas, replaced milk at home with a dried mix of whey protein, coconut oil and corn syrup called Morning Moo’s. She mixed up the first batch and served it to her children from a milk carton. 
 
 “They couldn’t even tell,” said Ms. Bailey, who now prefers it to milk. 
 
 She keeps 12 cans locked in a hall closet, along with her gun. “I hate to be one of those prepper people,” she said, “but if something major happens and we are stuck in our home, we have milk.” ||||| Taste-Testing Food for the Apocalypse 
 
 7/19/2016 11:41AM
– Doomsday food is all grown up, and it's not just being marketed for "preparedness" anymore. "The zombie apocalypse isn’t going to happen," a rep for freeze-dried food maker Mountain House, tells the Wall Street Journal, which had staffers try different foods and got myriad reactions. "But you might get snowed in and not be able to go the grocery store.” Such companies are trying to market the heaps of so-called bunker food—typically freeze-dried and dehydrated into pouches and tubs—as helpful in many situations, including camping, or needing something quick when a bunch of guests suddenly show up, or not being able to shop when you're sick. "The Holy Grail for long-term, shelf-stable food is to become an everyday purchase,” says vice president of marketing for Blue Chip Group Inc., the maker of hundreds of types of freeze-dried entrees sold at Walmart. That's because the typical bunker purchase—say, a $3,599 Blue Chip kit that can feed four people for a year—is a one-time deal, and this $300 million specialty market needs repeat customers to thrive. Phil Cox of Legacy Food says bunker food buyers tend to be "fiscally conservative, politically independent or Republican, and adds: "The best thing that can happen for my business is Hillary Clinton winning the presidency." Meanwhile, one customer who wanted to save money giving her kids milk switched to a dried mix of whey protein, coconut oil and corn syrup called Morning Moo’s. She says they can't tell the difference and she keeps a dozen cans locked in her hall closet, next to her gun. "I hate to be one of those prepper people," she says, "but if something major happens and we are stuck in our home, we have milk." (Scientists warn we're on the verge of a post-antibiotics apocalypse.)