Educating and informing consumers
Providing consumer choice
In 2010, key product-related initiatives undertaken to champion a healthy eating and drinking culture included:
Healthy eating: We have reformulated the nutrients in a range of dairy, juice and milk products. To help people who need to avoid gluten, we have been working towards removing gluten from many of our products. Yoplait yogurts, Dairy Farmers Thick and Creamy yogurts, Dairy Farmers milks and Pura milks are now gluten free.
We have reduced the sugar content of Yoplait Go-Gurt by 20-30%, and boosted the calcium content and added vitamin D to Yoplait Baby First Yogurt, Yoplait Petit Miam Toddler and Yoplait Go-Gurt to help build healthy bones and teeth. We launched Dairy Farmers New in New South Wales and Queensland, which tastes like full cream milk but has only 2% of the fat of full cream milk, while retaining the goodness of the calcium and protein contained in full cream milk.
We launched a 250mL fruit juice product for school-aged children and made Yoplait Baby First Yogurt and Yoplait Petit Miam Toddler available in aged-appropriate portion sizes for young children.
Yoplait forme extended its product offering in the weight management space with the launch of Yoplait forme Satisfy – a single serve, no fat* yogurt, high in protein and fibre, and with a low glycemic index.
These reformulations add to our growing range of products designed to meet specific consumer wellbeing needs such as Pura HeartActive™ milk, which contains plant sterols, which can help lower cholesterol and Pura Kids with omega-3 DHA has been specially developed for one to three year olds and can provide children with 75% of their daily omega-3 needs in just one 250mL serve.
Many of these products meet the healthy school canteen criteria for children. Some such as Yoplait Go-Gurt and Big M 250mL Lunchbox pack, can be identified by a National Foods ‘schools smart logo’ that appears on the front of the pack.
Healthy drinking: We don’t in principle believe that punitive taxation is an effective tool in dealing with misuse. However, while such a system exists, we support the use of the excise regime to encourage the consumption of lower alcohol beers as one strategy to change drinking behaviour in Australia and New Zealand. Our ongoing investment in the mid-strength and low-strength alcohol segments of the beer market (all of which enjoy a lower rate of excise than full-strength) continued in 2010, with key achievements outlined below:
- Hahn Super Dry 3.5, a mid-strength extension of our popular Hahn Super Dry brand, launched in 2009 was, by September 2010, the fifth biggest contributor to volume growth in the packaged beer market vs. a year ago1.
- XXXX Summer Bright Lager, a lower ABV product (4.2% as opposed to the 5% of current competitors) aimed at 18-29-year-old drinkers also launched in 2009 was, by the end of September 2010, the biggest contributor to volume growth in the packaged beer market vs. a year ago1.
In 2010 we developed a new innovation under the Hahn trademark, Hahn White – a Belgian style wheat beer, or ‘white’ beer, which is a lower ABV product (4.2%). In addition to the standard tap and 330ml stubbie formats, Hahn White is available in a 735ml wine shaped bottle, to position beer as a product suitable for sharing in a similar fashion to wine. Spiced with orange and coriander essences, Hahn White is best served the traditional Belgian way – with a slice of orange. - In New Zealand we have launched two low-carb lagers: Speight’s Traverse and Stella Légère and expanded the Mac’s non-alcoholic range in 2010 to include Mac’s Blackcurrant and Mac’s Lemon Crush. This is in addition to the already successful Mac’s Ginger Beer and Mac’s Green Apple.
In our wine business, Preece Lighter in Alcohol (LIA) was launched in 2009 to meet the increasing consumer need for lighter in alcohol wines. The LIA wine segment has increased by 62% in the last two years, with the market worth an estimated $61.2 million (excluding Moscato, AC Nielsen November 2010).
Three Preece Lighter in Alcohol variants were launched, including Preece LIA Sparkling, Preece LIA Semillon Sauvignon Blanc and Preece Moscato.
Already the Semillon Sauvignon Blanc has grown 237% and the Sparkling 243% (MAT November 2010, AC Nielsen). Following this success the broader Preece range (including a Shiraz, Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc and Sparkling) has undergone a brand refresh with new packaging, the introduction of lightweight bottles across the range, and a reduction in oak and ABV in the Chardonnay, Shiraz, Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon.
Educating our people
We have run internal education sessions on topics ranging from ‘Food, nutrition and health trends’ and ‘Nutritional attributes of cheese, soy and dairy beverages’, to ‘Weight management’ and ‘Sugar’ throughout the year to improve our people’s product and health knowledge and foster business innovation and opportunities. Feedback has been positive and they will continue throughout 2011.
We also continued a social responsibility initiative in 2010, which equips our people with the three Ps – Plan, Pace and Protect – a tool to help our people make responsible choices when planning and attending work-related social activities.
- Less than 0.15% fat
- Nielsen Australia ScanTrack, MAT to 30/09/2010