Better-for-you brands like the veggie-packed frozen waffle maker Evergreen, are driving sales and prompting retailers, like Kroger, to rethink their sets to meet evolving consumer demand.
“It’s about 14% higher growth seen in the most nutritious products on the shelf,” said Laura Brown, a registered dietitian and director of nutrition at Kroger Health.
The trend is driving change at Kroger, which is focused on helping consumers find the most nutritious products in the store, Brown explained at the sixth annual Food As Medicine Summit in early May.
“Think about the fruit snack category. There are a lot of products in that category that say, ‘Made with real fruit,’ and they’re just sugar bombs,” she said. “So, there’s a lot of marketing misconception or deception, I guess I should say, out there. And so we’re trying to really figure out how we can put our health side of the business in the driver’s seat.”
She highlighted opportunities with the chain’s pharmacies to direct shoppers to more nutritious products that are “really connecting patients who are filling scripts or meeting with our dietitians with those better for you brands.”
Opportunities with better-for-you brands
Emily Groden left her job as a corporate lawyer in Chicago to launch a better-for-you waffle company for kids in 2020.
Six years later, the veggie-packed frozen waffles, sold under the brand name Evergreen, are available in more than 9,000 stores nationwide.
It’s a success story that’s become relatively common in recent years as startup companies release healthier versions of grocery store staples to dethrone market leaders.
The move from corporate law to CPG was driven by the birth of Groden’s first child, she said at the Food As Medicine Summit panel The Value and ROI of Food as Medicine.
“I needed something like a frozen waffle to feed her because I was working so much, but didn’t want to feed her any of the brands that were already on the shelf,” she explained in the panel .
Instead of settling for a leading brand, Groden made her own frozen waffles for her daughter, she said.
“After watching her devour them for about a year, I decided if I wasn’t the only mom out there, she probably wasn’t the only kid out there who wanted something like it,” she said.
Bringing in new shoppers
The market has changed along with consumer preference over the last six years, according to Groden.
But she has stuck with her original focus on healthy breakfast foods for kids, she said, adding that the more she learned about children’s health, the more she realized there was a need in the market for healthy kids’ food.
Only 10% of US kids get their daily recommended intake for vegetables, she said, calling it a “sad statistic.”
“If your kid gets a good breakfast in the morning, the less likely they are to have a sugar crash, and the more likely they are to be able to focus in school, and that leads to better opportunities down the road,” she said.
A single extra serving of fruits and vegetables per day reduces the chance of chronic disease by up to 7%, she said. “It’s a real problem that we can solve with just a little bit of work,” she said.
Building the category with some help
Frozen waffles already have 60% to 70% household penetration, and Evergreen is not only capturing market share, it’s bringing in new shoppers to the category, according to Groden.
“We have data that shows 20% of Evergreen shoppers are brand new to the frozen waffle category,” she said.
Investors who support better-for-you products and grocery chains normalizing health food are helping drive sales, she said.
Grocers giving better-for-you startup companies a shot is huge for businesses like Evergreen, Groden said.
“Often in the conventional mass channels, there used to be a separate section for natural products. More and more those are being integrated into the main set, which I love to see, because the natural sets don’t get nearly as much foot traffic as the main sets,” she said.
Investment in better-for-you
Investment is also key to the growth of healthy options, Groden said.
Nate Cooper, founder and managing partner at Barrell Ventures, who invested in numerous better-for-you CPG startups, told the panel that consumers want healthier options, but not at the expense of taste.
Consumers who are given more options will choose better-for-you varieties. “Products have to lead with taste. If you lead with health or function or benefits, you’re going to lose a great proportion of consumers,” he said.
