Alan Reed, senior vice president, U.S. manufacturing and ingredient market, Dairy Management Inc. (DMI), Rosemont, IL, agrees. “Yogurt is not a fringe category anymore,” he says. “It’s very mainstream. It’s in about 80% of consumers’ homes on a weekly basis, which is amazing. So, now that it’s not a little category, doubling that growth is going to require introducing some different things into the category than what we’ve seen before.”
Something old, something new
A whole constellation of trends brings new life to yogurt. “What we see as we add benefits is that the more compelling the benefit, the more likely it is to increase overall yogurt category growth,” says Alan Reed, senior vice president, U.S. manufacturing and ingredient market, Dairy Management Inc. (DMI), Rosemont, IL.
Experts who watch the category point to drivers like convenience and value as sending new products onto the market. Drinkable and shot-style products in particular have benefited from their on-the-go delivery. “I believe that U.S. consumers will keep discovering the attractiveness of drinking yogurts, which are convenient, healthful and refreshing,” says Mirjana Curic-Bawden, Ph.D., senior scientist, Chr. Hansen, Inc., Milwaukee.
“I believe that consumers are continuing to look for value,” notes Sean Creedon, field technical service representative, Cargill. He points to products that provide multiple benefits—nutritional, sensory, portability—in one package as answering that desire.
Scott Bodenhausen, team manager, dairy, Danisco USA, New Century, KS, predicts we’ll all see an increase in market share for value-oriented private-label products “as consumer spending drops off and people try to save money wherever they can. So the major producers may start to feel the pressure.”
Even as consumers hunt for bargains with one hand, they grasp for indulgence with the other. “The market for yogurt is segmenting into value and premium products,” says Minerva Calatayud, global product manager, sweet goods, cheese, & dairy, Givaudan Flavors, Cincinnati. While she notes that “global economic conditions remind us of the importance that food plays in providing value to consumers,” she also points out that “there is a strong desire for functional, healthful and ‘green’ products.” On the organic front, as many as 50 new organic cultured dairy items entered the U.S. market in 2007; moreover, yogurts have caught the clean-label bug, with many stripping their ingredient statements to the basics.