Back in the 60s Mrs Smith's pumpkin pies could be purchased at many establishments in SE PA fresh baked, delivered daily, either whole (bakeries/markets) or slices (restaurants). They were a local outfit and extremely good. Were talkin the returnable heavy gauge metal pie pans here.
After being bought out by some big conglomerate decades ago they placed on a steady descent to what I finally termed pumpkin flavored bubblegum. (really bad)
A local supermarket had the frozen take home and bake version (with samples that didn't seem too bad) on sale for $1.50 each (usually $5.79 according to the ad). I figured at that price I'd go for it.
After one a few days ago I figured it was a definite improvement over the bubblegum flavor of a few years back but no more.
Was in the same store today, looking at the same $1.50 each sale...bought another.
that's right dumb ass,
bake before serving.