HEINZ IS STIRRING UP RECIPES FOR MEAL-SOLUTIONS PROGRAMS

RICHARD TURCSIK

NEW ORLEANS -- Heinz USA is teaming up with retailers to create meal-solutions programs involving the Center Store.

Mark Trumbull, customer marketing manager at Heinz USA, a division of H.J. Heinz, Pittsburgh, said employing meal solutions helps retailers create value for consumers beyond distribution and single-product selling.

"For the retail account, this is an opportunity to increase their share of consumer food dollars," Trumbull said at the Results-Oriented Account Specific Marketing conference here. The meeting was sponsored by the Institute for International Research, New York.

"We have adopted a meal-planning strategy that offers core merchandising strategies across our brands. It will help us to increase brand and category consumption," Trumbull said.

"We are going to create an easy-to-execute home-meal solution program for [retail] accounts, Heinz and our brokers. The goal is to tie that purchase occasion with a usage occasion to drive consumption of the product," he added.

The strategy will be to align Heinz condiments with easy-to-prepare and easy-to-serve food suggestions that are economical and nutritious, Trumbull said.

He said Heinz has developed a program that offers retailers an easily executed package of merchandising vehicles that use host food tie-ins along with recipes.

Despite all the hype over Boston Market, Eatzi's, Red Lobster and other restaurant-based options, Trumbull said, more than 70% of meals are still prepared and eaten at home. However, 70% of women now work outside the home, and 40% of consumers don't know what they are going to eat for dinner each night.

"We're learning that moms don't like to plan and they hate to shop. They are looking for help in the planning part and shopping aspect of meal preparation," Trumbull said.

Trumbull said the Heinz program affords retailers the chance to provide consumers with meal options that reduce or eliminate planning and simplify shopping. Each recipe will take no more than 30 minutes to prepare and will use items like Heinz ketchup, Heinz vinegar and Heinz relish as key ingredients.

He added that as the nation's largest producer of private-label canned soups, Heinz is also working with retailers to build canned-soup sales by expanding its "taste test challenge" program nationally this year. The program ran last year in selected markets with favorable results, Trumbull said.