Butter began catching on as a pop-culture phenomenon in the early 2020s, attracting significant mainstream notice in 2025 and remaining top of mind in early 2026.
The trend manifests itself in many ways. Flavored butters (from truffle and miso to cinnamon-sugar), and butter boards for mixing and serving them, are everywhere online (hashtag #ButterTok). There is a noted flavored-butter influencer, Thomas Straker, whose social presence under the moniker All Things Butter gained prominence starting in 2022. Viral love of a French dish, radishes with salted butter, is still going strong after several years. Butter-flavored ice cream, and soft serve dipped in warm butter, are catching attention. Even videos of people eating whole sticks of butter, touted as a minimally processed “super food” (a claim not necessarily embraced by the medical community), went viral in 2025.
Perhaps these recipes and behaviors are contributing to the recent increase in consumption of butter; the U.S. population used a record high 6.8 pounds per person annually in 2024, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, as reported by the International Dairy Foods Association in December 2025.
In the non-foods space, meanwhile, Kitchenaid named Butter its Color of the Year for 2025, and items in the shape and color of butter continue to have a high profile in home furnishings, iPhone cases, jewelry, handbags, fashion, and more. Toy makers offer butter stick-shaped compounds and plush. There is even a new store in PortCredit, Canada, called Butter Bar, that offers everything from flavored butters and curated butter boards to butter-themed and colored linens, serving dishes, gifts, and related products.
Trend-watchers attribute the popularity of butter to a number of factors. On the food side, a desire for affordable indulgence during a time of high prices is one component, along with the rise of keto and paleo diets that favor fats and protein over carbs. On the non-foods side, drivers include consumers being drawn to the retro, midcentury feel of butter-yellow hues, along with the cheerfulness of the color as an antidote to the world’s current woes.
The butter trend is at the center of a number of recent lifestyle collaborations. For example:
- Drew Barrymore’s licensed Beautiful brand at Walmart released a new range of kitchen products last month, encompassing everything from spoons and spatulas to bowls, baking pans, toasters, and mixers in a butter-yellow hue called Buttercream. The limited-edition palette was inspired by the icing on a birthday cake, as well as Pantone’s Drew Barrymore Yellow, introduced in 2025. A collaboration with Christina Tosi and Milk Bar adds a baking mix to the array, allowing consumers to create a Buttercream-colored birthday shortbread.
- Land O’ Lakes paired with Clove Shoes in September 2025 for a drop of butter-colored sneakers. The limited-edition footwear featured the comfort, cleanability, and style for which Clove is known, in a yellow color inspired by Land O’Lakes butter. Shoe models as part of the partnership included a soft full-yellow style and a white option with butter-yellow accents. Charitable components were part of the collaboration as well.
- Crocs worked with kitchenware brand Our Place in fall 2025 for a limited-edition butter-yellow range of kitchen appliances, cookware, and hot grips, the latter designed to be customized by adding Crocs’ Jibbitz charms. The range of products includes versions of Our Place favorites like the Wonder Oven and Always Pan. Chef and cookbook author Molly Baz helped design the collection.
Collaborations in the food space are also growing. Sublime Butter and Clawson Farms partnered in December 2025 for Clawson Farms Stilton Butter with Beef Dripping, White Truffle & Confit Garlic. In November 2025, cheese brand Tillamook paired with Kewpie Mayonnaise for a limited-edition butter-mayo hybrid called Butternaise (which sold out in two minutes), marketed as an ingredient for grilled cheese sandwiches.
Tinned seafood brand Fishwife worked with Churn in October 2025 for Anchovy & Lemon Butter; Churn also created a hot honey butter with Paramount’s Mean Girls franchise in 2024. Straker, the influencer, collaborated with Alley Cats, an American-style pizza restaurant in London, in June 2024, for a limited-edition offering of dough balls dipped in a burnt chili butter. And the China-based Luckin coffee shop chain enlisted Thailand-headquartered Butterbear bakeries in late 2024 for a Little Butter Latte menu item made with New Zealand butter, as part of its Christmas drinks series.
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