Secrets of marketing to mothers

Winter 2011-2012 – The modern mother is a remarkable creature. Her life is a balancing act between raising the kids, pressures at work and increasingly, handling the family finances.

McDonald’s committed to dialogue with mothers

Winter 2011-2012 – Despite some ups and downs, McDonald’s is pledging strong commitment to ongoing communication with mothers as a best defense against its detractors. As global health issues escalate, the company is not waiting on regulation, but rather taking the lead to find out what mothers want to help the chain offer healthier choices and market nutritional options more effectively.

Can Frumoo lure kids back to milk?

Winter 2011-2012 – In an effort to get her own children to drink milk, UK mother-of-five Maria Leavesley started blending it with fruit. Her idea was so successful she spotted a business opportunity and launched Frumoo, a milk and fruit smoothie designed to appeal to kids. Though the brand has seen moderate success, the product still struggles with an identity crisis in that it is neither juice nor traditional smoothie.

Dairy Crest banks on Chedds to grab a chunk of kids’ cheese sales

Turning granola bars into kids’ dairy snacks

Winter 2011-2012 – Kraft, like many dairy companies, is keen to see dairy make more impact in snacking. Faced with the challenge of how to take dairy into snacking, Kraft’s response has been instead to take snacks into the dairy aisle. The key consumer group Kraft is targeting is mothers.

Biothera capitalises on strong science for immunity ingredient

Winter 2011-2012 – The risks of commercialising new ingredient technologies are extremely high and dwarfed only by the amount of science required to support it. The stakes for both suppliers and manufacturers are exceptional. They are even higher for kids’ products. But at least one company had a very good year in 2011.

Can fortification revitalize Kellogg’s struggling kids’ cereal brands?

Winter 2011-2012 – In early 2012, cereal maker Kellogg will begin ramping up its plan to fortify several of its UK-based kids’ brands with vitamin D. Though the company has a long history of fortifying its cereals with vitamins to address deficiencies in the population, news of the company’s declining sales for 2011 in Europe overall and, particularly in the UK, indicate there may be a secondary purpose to the strategy.

Crunch makes the difference for freeze-dried fruit snacks

Winter 2011-2012 – Somewhere in the annals of food history someone decided that snacks should be crunchy. Modern consumers buy into this in a big way. Kids especially like their snacks crunchy. Mothers like them convenient, but often have to sacrifice nutritional value. Enter Funky Monkey Snacks, a Midwestern US company that uses a proprietary freeze-drying process to provide the nutrition of fresh, whole fruit with the crunch of chips and the sweetness of candy. Can fruit that crunches revolutionize the snack category?

Brands navigate tough US regulatory climate for kids’ products

Winter 2011-2012 – The constant threat of tougher regulation of food and beverage marketing to children has kept American industry on its toes – and has resulted in more innovation and higher-margin opportunities in better-for-you fare for kids that companies might not have realized were possible without being prodded.

Five elements of innovation in the tough world of kids’ dairy

Winter 2011-2012 – Innovating successfully in kids’ dairy is one of the most difficult challenges. Most of the new ideas that have been tried over the last decade have failed – or at best resulted in ultra-niche products.

Stickers and colour get picky eaters chewing

Winter 2011-2012 – Any parent who has ever “bribed” their children to eat vegetables can draw comfort from a study (1) of three and four-year-olds.

A third of teens eat fewer than one fruit a day

Winter 2011-2012 –Teens in the US aren’t eating enough fruit and vegetables, according to a study from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Vitamin D levels below target in 15% of minority children

Winter 2011-2012 – Reports of the disease rickets are particularly evident in minority infants and children, but little is known about vitamin D in this demographic group.

Iron in teen years can affect brain in later life

Winter 2011-2012 – A lack of iron early in life can affect the brain’s physical structure.

Teen boys’ weight booms

Winter 2011-2012 – More teenage boys in the US are getting heavier, reveals the latest data on obesity prevalence in the US.

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Kids’ brands sales stall but dairy still thrives

July - September 2011 – Better-for-you products aimed at kids are losing momentum in the US market with some categories stalling and others shrinking as financial pressures increasingly nudge parents away from the higher prices and single-serve formats of items meant specifically for children and toward lower-priced items that suit the whole family.

Danone sows seeds of growth

July - September 2011 – The plastic toy in the cereal box is an old promotional tool, and now Danone in the US has updated the idea by including in its kids’ yogurt packs seeds that children can plant. Combined with a tree-planting scheme to offset carbon emissions, the company will be hoping the initiatives give kids’ yogurt a much-needed boost.

Schools welcome Dean’s reduced-sugar chocolate milk

July - September 2011– Creating a reduced-sugar brand of chocolate milk has enabled Dean Foods to sell the controversial drink to schools, retail and food service – and already Dean is considering extensions to the TruMoo brand.

Snikiddy range growing up

Snacks king Organix aims to take bite out of kids’ meals market

July - September 2011– Swiss-based Hero Group has enjoyed 16% growth in its market-leading Organix brand in 2011, following 20% growth in 2010. The elements of its success include keeping at the cutting edge of snacking trends – and staying close to the brand’s natural and “closest to homemade” heritage.

McDonald’s surprises with Happy Meal makeover

July - September 2011– Whether or not McDonald’s surprising “thorough makeover” of its Happy Meals – cutting calories by shrinking the portion size of fries and including sliced apples as standard – will improve the health of Americans is debatable. But experts agree the fast food chain had no choice but to respond to the nutrition critics.

Industry: end marketing control moves

July - September 2011– Dissatisfied with recent concessions by government over its plans to control marketing to children, US food and beverage interests are demanding a complete halt to the regulators’ efforts.

Overall quality of pregnant woman’s diet affects birth defect risk

July - September 2011 – The overall quality of a pregnant woman’s diet is linked with risk for two types of serious birth defects, a new study from the Stanford University School of Medicine has shown.

Inflammatory food toxins found in high levels in infants

July - September 2011– Researchers from Mount Sinai School of Medicine have found high levels of food toxins called Advanced Glycation End products (AGEs) in infants.

Vitamin D-fortified milk enough to boost serum 25(OH)D

July - September 2011– In New Zealand, where vitamin D intake in young children is minimal, scientists have found that habitual consumption of vitamin D-fortified milk providing a mean intake of nearly 4 μg/d is effective in achieving adequate year-round serum 25(OH)D for most children.

Kids who drink more green tea have less flu?

July - September 2011– Drinking between one and five cups a day of green tea may prevent influenza infection in children, according to scientists in Japan.

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