Gourmet Food Catalogs Worth Ordering by Mail

Mail-order food predates almost every other catalog category on this site. When Harry and David Holmes began shipping Oregon pears across the country in 1934, they established a template the gourmet-food business still runs on: take something perishable and regional, pack it to survive a few days in transit, and sell it to people who could not otherwise get it. Nearly a century later the category has grown to cover steaks, cheese, cookies, charcuterie, and artisan pantry staples — but the core proposition is unchanged. A gourmet food catalog edits a vast specialty market down to a giftable, shippable selection, and the right one depends on whether you are feeding a holiday table, sending a corporate gift, or simply ordering something for yourself that the local grocery store does not carry.

Harry & David

Harry & David (harryanddavid.com) is the founding name of the American gourmet-gift business. Established in 1934 in Medford, Oregon, on the family's Bear Creek Orchards, the company built its reputation on the Royal Riviera pear — a large, buttery dessert pear it still sells as its signature item. The brand has been owned by 1-800-Flowers.com since 2014, which expanded its gift-basket and corporate-gifting reach considerably.

The catalog's strength is the curated gift tower and basket: the Tower of Treats, the Moose Munch popcorn assortment, and seasonal fruit boxes that arrive ready to give. Pricing sits at the premium end of the category, and the value is in the presentation and the reliability of delivery during the crowded holiday window rather than in raw quantity. If you want a gift that reads as generous and arrives looking the part with no assembly on your end, Harry & David is the default the rest of the category is measured against.

Omaha Steaks

Omaha Steaks (omahasteaks.com) is the dominant name in mail-order meat. The company traces to 1917, when the Simon family founded a butcher business in Omaha, Nebraska, and it remains family-operated across multiple generations — one of the longer continuous family ownerships in the catalog world. Its core product is flash-frozen, vacuum-sealed beef shipped in dry-ice coolers, anchored by aged filet mignon, ribeyes, and the burgers that have become a catalog staple in their own right.

What distinguishes Omaha Steaks is the combination of consistency and bundling. Combo packages pair steaks with sides, desserts, and the company's seasoned burgers, which makes them a frequent choice for gifting to someone who grills. Pricing is premium per pound, but the frequent promotional bundles bring the effective cost down, and the dry-ice packaging is engineered to keep contents frozen through standard ground shipping. For a meat-forward gift or a freezer restock of restaurant-grade cuts, this is the catalog with the deepest track record.

Hickory Farms

Hickory Farms (hickoryfarms.com) occupies the summer-sausage-and-cheese center of the gift-basket market. Founded in 1951 and long associated with Toledo, Ohio, the brand became a holiday-mall fixture before consolidating around its catalog and online channel. Its signature is the beef summer sausage paired with cheese, mustard, and crackers in a giftable box — the assortment most people picture when they think of a classic holiday food gift.

The catalog's appeal is value and familiarity. Hickory Farms baskets land at a more accessible price point than Harry & David's fruit-and-confection towers, which makes them a common choice for volume gifting — the box you send to a dozen clients or extended-family households without the per-unit cost climbing out of reach. The selection skews savory and shelf-stable, so it ships and stores easily. For a recognizable, budget-conscious holiday gift that needs no explanation, Hickory Farms is the practical pick.

Cheryl's Cookies

Cheryl's Cookies (cheryls.com) narrows the gourmet-gift idea down to a single category and owns it. Founded in 1981 by Cheryl Krueger in Westerville, Ohio, and now part of the 1-800-Flowers family alongside Harry & David, the company is built around individually wrapped buttercream-frosted cookies sold in tins and gift boxes.

The individual wrapping is the quiet differentiator: it makes Cheryl's a natural fit for office gifts and shared break rooms where a loose box of cookies is awkward. The frosted cutout cookies rotate with the seasons — hearts, snowmen, fall leaves — which keeps the catalog relevant to occasion gifting beyond the December rush. Pricing is mid-tier, and the focused product line means the quality is more consistent than a sprawling assortment can promise. If the gift is specifically a sweet treat rather than a full basket, Cheryl's does that one thing better than the generalists.

Zingerman's Mail Order

Zingerman's (zingermans.com) is the artisan end of the category. The Ann Arbor, Michigan, business was founded in 1982 by Paul Saginaw and Ari Weinzweig as a delicatessen, and its mail-order arm grew into a nationally known source for traditionally made foods — farmhouse cheeses, estate olive oils, cured meats, sourdough breads, and single-origin coffee, each sold with detailed sourcing notes.

This is the catalog for the recipient who reads labels and cares where the food comes from. Where the mass gift catalogs optimize for presentation and reliability, Zingerman's optimizes for provenance and flavor, and the prices reflect it — this is the most expensive option here per item. The payoff is genuine specialty food rather than a holiday assortment, the kind of gift that lands with someone who cooks seriously or already knows the difference between a commodity and an estate olive oil. For a food-obsessed recipient, it is the most credible name on this list.

Shipping perishables: what to know before you order

Gourmet food differs from every other catalog category in one critical way: much of it is perishable, and the shipping logistics are part of what you are buying. Frozen items like Omaha Steaks ship in insulated coolers packed with dry ice, sized to keep the contents frozen through standard ground transit — but that engineering assumes timely delivery, so a package left on a porch during a heat wave is a real failure mode worth planning around. Many of these catalogs let you schedule a delivery date for exactly this reason, which is the single most useful feature for gift shipments to someone who may not be home.

Two practical rules save the most grief. First, order well ahead of holidays: the gourmet-gift catalogs hit capacity in early-to-mid December, and the cheapest shipping tiers sell out or stop guaranteeing arrival dates first. Second, factor shipping cost into the comparison — perishable and cold-chain shipping is expensive, and a basket that looks competitively priced can land well above a rival once cold-pack surcharges are added. Several of these brands offer membership or free-shipping thresholds that change the math if you order more than once a year. Reading the shipping terms before you fill a cart is the difference between a gift that arrives perfect and one that arrives thawed.

Matching the catalog to the occasion

The five catalogs sort cleanly by what you are actually trying to do.

For a gift that needs to impress with no effort, Harry & David and Omaha Steaks are the two safe premium choices, split by whether the recipient prefers sweet-and-fruit or savory-and-meat. When you are sending many gifts and the per-box cost matters, Hickory Farms and Cheryl's are the value workhorses. And when the recipient genuinely cares about food — not just receiving a gift but eating something exceptional — Zingerman's is worth the premium the others do not charge. Most gift-givers end up keeping two of these in rotation: one mass-market default for broad gifting and one specialist for the people who would notice the difference.

References

• Harry & David: https://www.harryanddavid.com
• Omaha Steaks: https://www.omahasteaks.com
• Hickory Farms: https://www.hickoryfarms.com
• Cheryl's Cookies: https://www.cheryls.com
• Zingerman's Mail Order: https://www.zingermans.com