Microsoft Word, Cookbooks and a Rolled Up Newspaper

“What do you need special software for to just make a recipe book? What’s wrong with Microsoft Word?” My nephew eyed me suspiciously. It was two years ago and I needed his software skills if I were going to make a quality recipe book.

Because I needed his help, I used the newspaper instead of the phone book to whack him in the noggin.

“Because,” I started, trying to seem patient, “Microsoft Word is designed for making letters. Microsoft Word does reports. Microsoft Word does resumes. Microsoft Word does Christmas letters. Microsoft Word does NOT organize recipes very well.”

“Huh?” he replied. (For an MBA he’s pretty thick.)

“I want a recipe book that’s alphabetized. I want a recipe book with a table of contents. I want a recipe book broken up by ‘cookies’ and ‘salads’ and ‘fish’. And I want to spend my time thinking about each recipe, not about how to make the indent in Microsoft Word go away.”

A glimmer of sentience seemed to appear behind his dull eyes. “Huh. Are there a lot of older women like you?”

“Yes. And don’t call me older.” Whack!

“And would they also like to be able to add photographs easily?”

“Yes. It’s a pain in Microsoft Word. The text goes everywhere when you put a picture in.”

“How about other features?”

“Well,” I offered, “it’d be nice to have an address book built in. And a birthday calendar. And a family tree—”

“And Microsoft Word can’t do that?”

“Well,” I admitted, “I guess it could. If you spent time organizing it all beforehand and you were willing to fight with it to make it look right.”

“What do you think about starting a software business?” he asked. “We could help thousands of people make their own recipe books.”

“And I’d get my own recipe book? Without having to use Microsoft Word?” I considered it. “Maybe…”

It’s two years later and our little cookbook software business is breaking sales records every month. We’ve helped a lot more people than I ever dreamed. And I got my own recipe book without using Microsoft Word.

But the best news is that my nephew has finally got his act together. I almost never have to use the newspaper anymore.

About Erin Miller

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Posted in Odds and Ends.

2 Comments

  1. I have been working on making family heritage and family cookbooks for several years. My recipe program is Master Cook 9.
    I have used MS WORD on several of my previous cookbooks for the family. However, after using your software, the work seems easier to use and is going so much faster. I only have had your product several weeks, and already have over 400 recipes entered into my current cookbook! Except for a few, all have photos. I have given up on any current recipe software to have the ability to export the recipes into WORD format, and believe me taking out the recipe headers before adding them to a cookbook is a project in itself! Using your software and the cut and paste method works extremely well, at least for my purposes. The spell checker included is also helpful, and I am trying to remember to run it after I am finished entering my recipes each day, so I will not have to sit for hours later on down the road. I still have some work to do on the biography part, and I expect to finish up the book in about two more weeks time.

    Thank you for putting this software together and selling it at such a reasonable price. I hope your company sells millions of copies! I am already recommending it to all of my friends who are also making their own family cookbooks, and will continue to do so.

    Dee

  2. Thank you so much for your kind comments, Dee! Seeing this post just made my day.

    I don’t know if you are registered with Amazon, but it would be a huge help to our business if you’d be willing to copy and paste this post in a user review of our product:
    http://www.amazon.com/Matildas-Fantastic-Cookbook-Software-3-1/dp/B000TVXNGS/ref=sr_1_1/105-6651992-6011600?ie=UTF8&s=software&qid=1185913894&sr=8-1

    I’m glad you enjoy the product and I’m so proud of the team of people who put it together. I never imagined we’d get such an overwhelmingly positive response.

    Thank you again, Dee. Please email us a photo of the book (and you!) when you finish! We’ve often talked about doing a “customer corner” where we feature pictures of people and their cookbooks. (We wouldn’t do it without your permission, though.)

    Matilda

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