In Reader’s Digest’s new series, “Is It Really Rude to…,” Charlotte Hilton Andersen tackles low-stakes etiquette questions from everyday life using a combination of her common sense and vast knowledge from writing 50-plus etiquette stories for this site. Have a situation you can’t stop ruminating on? Email us at advice@tmbi.com.
Have you ever set down store-bought cookies at a potluck and then speed-walked away like you were fleeing a crime scene? Are you a monster, or is everyone else just overachieving? Before I answer that, let me tell you about the time I accidentally convinced my entire neighborhood that I was some kind of cookie artisan savant. The annual neighborhood potluck was looming, I was drowning in work deadlines, and I had approximately six minutes of free time. So I did what any reasonable person would do: I bought one of those refrigerated cookie-dough logs—you know, the ones with the holiday shapes magically sculpted into the center—sliced them, baked them and arranged them on my own plate to better pass them off as homemade.
At the party, a woman picked up one of my cookies, admired it and asked how I made it. At first, I genuinely thought she was messing with me. Like, clearly these were store-bought, right? But she seemed sincere, so in a moment of pure panic, I committed to the bit. “Oh, well, I very carefully tinted different batches of dough in the appropriate fall colors, shaped the pumpkin in one long cylinder, rolled plain dough around it, then sliced and baked them.”
You guys, she believed me. For months afterward, she’d bring up my “amazing artistic ability” at parties. I lived in quiet shame, wondering if I should come clean or just lean into my new identity as a cookie wizard.
Friends, this is the anxiety spiral that group food events create. Whether it’s a bake sale you got roped into, an office potluck, book club snacks, game day spreads or a co-worker’s baby shower, the etiquette dilemma is the same: Is store-bought OK, or are you committing some unspoken social crime?
Here’s the thing about these events—they exist in a strange purgatory between “casual gathering” and “The Great British Bake Off finale.” On one hand, it’s just a table of desserts to share and maybe to raise money for your church, your kid’s school or some community fundraiser at the library. On the other hand, Ashleigh brought a three-tier lemon cake with hand-piped buttercream rosettes and its own Instagram account. Sure, the stated goal is raising money or feeding people, but there’s often that undercurrent of competition and judgment. She spent hours crafting a true work of art and you’re showing up with something that has a barcode?
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The pros and cons
I can see the case for good etiquette on both sides. The purist case is real: Homemade can taste better, is more customizable and lets people avoid ingredients they don’t want. Plus, some people genuinely enjoy baking and sharing their culinary talents for a good cause. A slightly lopsided cupcake says, “Someone cared enough to make this (maybe with a 6-year-old sous-chef who licked the spatula).” It’s giving wholesome chaos and realness in a world where so much is manufactured.
But here’s the counterpoint: It’s 2025, and not all of us are in our domestic goddess era. Some of us work 50 hours a week and are just trying to survive, not thrive. Some of us have ovens that are basically just storage units for pizza boxes. Some of us possess the baking skills of a distracted golden retriever (hi!). And it feels like performative hustle culture, just with sugar instead of 5 a.m. ice baths. But if participation requires a three-hour buttercream tutorial, people will quietly opt out—exactly the opposite of community.
What the (very) unofficial polls say
When I polled my friends on social media, 60% said bringing packaged treats or snacks isn’t rude at all, 30% said it’s fine if you make it look like you tried (think: cute bags, handwritten labels, a seasonal serving platter), and just 10% said it’s flat-out rude. So even by the court of public opinion, store-bought is overwhelmingly acquitted.
My friend Sarah proved this point brilliantly last year. She’d just gotten off a red-eye international flight and had one hour before she had to donate something to the school bake sale. So she stopped at Dunkin’, bought three dozen assorted donuts and brought them to the bake sale in the original box. That level of IDGAF is exactly why we’re friends (and also why I have her argue with customer service for me). Those donuts sold out in 15 minutes. Kids don’t care about your artisanal lavender shortbread; they want the sprinkle-bomb they saw on TikTok. And her box raised the same money as the “from-scratch” stuff—with zero midnight stress-baking.
And there’s a practical twist: Many office parties, bake sales and other community events now require prepackaged, labeled items due to concerns about food allergies, dietary restrictions and home kitchen safety standards. Your store-bought tray isn’t a shortcut; it’s compliance.
But for me, the real question isn’t whether store-bought is rude—it’s whether we want to build a real community. These days, when the norm is to drive straight into your garage and shut the door rather than chat with your neighbors, we need every community interaction we can get.
I’ll also offer a cautionary tale from my friend Jess, who once got really offended by a Costco sheet cake at our book club potluck, to the point where she wanted to pull it off the table. (“It wasn’t even cut! Or put on a nice platter!”) Later, she learned the person had worked a 12-hour night shift and came early to help the host set up. People loved the cake, and Jess felt terrible afterward. People just want dessert, not a morality play about frosting-covered priorities.
The verdict: Not rude at all. Bringing packaged goods to a bake sale—or any food-sharing event—is a completely valid form of participation, and in many cases, it’s actually preferred or required. If homemade brings you joy, absolutely do that. But if your best contribution is a box of fancy Trader Joe’s cookies, also yes. The goal is community and contribution, not winning Cupcake Wars. The only rude moves are over-promising and no-showing, handling food while sick, or yucking someone else’s yum. So bring your Entenmann’s with pride. Just maybe don’t accidentally start an elaborate lie about your baking skills that you’ll have to maintain for months.
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