BLENDS ARE COOKING

RICHARD TURCSIK

Blends are bringing a different sheen to the cooking oil category.

Consumers are looking toward healthier eating and desiring to lower cholesterol rates, but refusing to give up their favorite fried foods. These preferences all play a part in stimulating sales growth in cooking oil blends, retailers told SN.

The proliferation of cooking oil blends is causing some chains to reexamine how much space they allot to the category, although most retailers said they haven't had major problems fitting the oils into their existing sets so far.

While traditional cooking and vegetable oils are made with blends of different oils, the new breed of cooking oil blends contains canola oil as the key ingredient. Canola oil -- a relatively new oil made from the canola seed -- is high in mono-unsaturated

fat, which is helpful in lowering cholesterol.

Most of the retailers interviewed told SN they expect canola-based oil blends will keep gaining, often at the expense of other vegetable oils, as consumers seek new ways to lower their cholesterol and manufacturers step up advertising and marketing of the products.

On the other hand, the sales of straight oils are not about to drain completely away, they added, and some pockets of consumers still prefer products such as corn oils for specific purposes.

"About 60% of our total cooking oil category sales are currently derived from blended oils," said John Corcoran, category manager at Big Y Foods, Springfield, Mass.

"Blended oil growth so far is due to the health consciousness of our shoppers. We expect the blended oils to grow maybe another 5% over the next year, but the total category will not be growing, and the blended oils will be taking sales away from other oils," he said.

Over the past two years the three leading cooking oil manufacturers have all introduced blended oils with a high concentration of canola: Hunt Wesson, Fullerton, Calif., has Wesson Best Blend; Procter & Gamble, Cincinnati, has Crisco Natural Blend Oil and Crisco Corn Canola, a 50/50 blend, and CPC International, Englewood Cliffs, N.J., manufactures Mazola Right Blend.

Many smaller manufacturers also offer blends, as do retailers through their private labels.

"We think the blends are going to be a pretty big category. Canola consumption is growing, and we think blended oil is important because it offers the low saturated fat of canola oil with the same taste of vegetable oil," said a spokeswoman for one leading manufacturer.

Although the major product tracking firms do not break down oil sales by segment, their data show that despite all the talk about eating healthy and avoiding fried foods, cooking oil dollar sales have increased and volume is basically holding steady.

According to Information Resources Inc., Chicago, for the 52-week period ended Nov. 6, 1994, cooking and salad oils had supermarket sales of $812.2 million, an increase of 6%.

Figures provided by Nielsen North America, Schaumburg, Ill., show that for the 52-week period ended Sept. 10, 1994, unit volume dipped 1.4% to 366.4 million containers sold. According to Nielsen, Wesson is the largest cooking oil brand in the United States, followed by private label, Crisco and Mazola.

"Blended oils will continue to grow. They are healthier for everybody's lifestyle, and that is what everybody is addressing. It is an ongoing battle because these oils are lower in fat, cholesterol, etc.," said Nick Wedberg, vice president of sales at Plumb's, Muskegon, Mich.

"Based on accumulated sales figures, the cooking oil category is a very vibrant category for us with a very high turnover. Apparently from a health standpoint people do go for the healthier oils," said William Vitulli, vice president of government and community relations at A&P, Montvale, N.J.

"The cooking oil category is a big volume category, and that is why so much room is given to it in the supermarket," he added.

"People are switching to more mono-unsaturated oils, like canola oil and olive oil, and looking for these oils in products," explained Layne Lieberman-Anapol, director of nutrition at King Kullen Grocery Co., Westbury, N.Y.

"I've gotten complaints from consumers who do not want to use an olive oil in a baking recipe because they do not want an olive flavor in it. For baking, a canola or blended oil would be ideal," she said.

Mark Polsky, senior vice president at Magruder, Rockville, Md., said that for some unknown reason, all his oil sales were down for the key Christmas period.

"Oil sales for the holidays were down considerably from last year, and I'm not sure why. Baking and related items were up, but oil was down. Most of the cake recipes require some type of oil, so I don't know what people were using."

He added that blended oils have garnered a big chunk of his oil business.

"Our blended cooking oil sales have grown to encompass about 30% of our total oil sales, and now they are holding steady. Blended sales might creep up a little bit, but I don't think it will grow all that much more," he said.

Doug Rodden, director of purchasing at Minyard Food Stores, Coppell, Texas, said that while blended oils sell well in his stores, straight oils, like corn, sell better because they are liked by the area's large Hispanic population.

"We sell about 40 cases of Wesson Best Blend per week. By comparison, regular canola oil sells about 87 cases a week, corn oil sells 66 cases and regular vegetable oil sells 108 cases per week," he said.

Rodden said Minyard stocks up to four brands of blended oil, and they "all sell pretty much the same."

Other retailers said the blended oil craze was just starting to hit their markets.

David DiGeronimo, head grocery buyer at Victory Super Markets, Leominster, Mass., said blended oils are "very slowly gaining a toehold" in his market of suburban Boston.

"I don't think people are switching over that quick; they seem to be staying with the regular cooking oils. We carry every blend that is available, and all of the major manufacturers have reformulated, but it is going to take a while until they take over," he said.

Pat Redmond, a grocery merchandiser at Rosauers Supermarkets, Spokane, Wash., said blended oils are just starting to catch on in his market.

Rosauers stocks three or four different brands of blends, and Redmond said the new products are leading him to reexamine how he merchandises the aisle.

"There is plenty of space in those aisles to fit the new oils in, but we should have cut those spaces down a long time ago. We just keep letting the boys fill it up.

"We need to do some real space management studies in that area. It is just like the detergent aisles with the ultras. We really haven't reduced the space, but we have certainly increased the numbers," he said.

Other retailers said they haven't had problems fitting the blends in the aisle.

"In our stores we basically just cut the blends in next to the other brands. When Crisco came out with a canola blend we just put it next to their other items. We basically just reduce facings, and usually our wholesaler, Spartan Stores, Grand Rapids, Mich., makes some space by discontinuing some products and that frees up some room," said Wedberg of Plumb's.

Magruder's Polsky said, "To fit in the blends we just shuffled some things around. A lot of manufacturers dropped some items when they brought the blends in. For example, they might have had a straight canola, but when they came out with a canola blend they dropped the straight, so it wasn't a real problem."

"Every time we take on a new product we have to make a change to the set," said Rodden of Minyard. "We only buy the 48-ounce size in the cooking oils because it sells best, except for Puritan, in which we have two sizes."

"Cooking oil sets and merchandising practices have been segregated in our planogram, with cooking oils, olive oil and gourmet oils," noted Big Y's Corcoran.

In terms of pricing, retailers said the blends were priced at or slightly above traditional vegetable and corn oils. Most said they advertise their cooking oils as a category and include the blends.

"Our blends are line priced with the regular oils. And I promote them all at the same price, whether it is corn oil, vegetable oil or a canola blend," said DiGeronimo of Victory.

Retailers also said that manufacturer advertising on the blends remains high and is helping to stimulate sales.

"There is quite a bit of couponing on the blends. There is a lot of couponing activity through magazines and newspapers, and they advertise a lot during daytime programming," said Wedberg of Plumb's.

Corcoran of Big Y added that blended oil "advertising is geared toward the health-conscious consumer, with couponing and trade promotions remaining at about the same levels."