KRAFT KEEPS KOOL FOR THE KIDS

KELLY GATES

Many of the items in the noncarbonated beverage category -- from juices and teas to energy drinks and water -- are marketed to young adults and baby boomers who are demanding a wide variety of healthy products. However, when reaching a younger audience, manufacturers must consider a completely different set of criteria for developing and marketing their brands.

Kool Aid, a registered trademark of Kraft Foods, closely follows popular children's trends when developing new flavors and new items to add to its product lines.

A recent trend Kraft recognized in its consumers is the desire that many children have to interact with products. To create a solution for this, the company set out to develop a new powdered drink that enabled its young consumers to not just taste its flavored drinks, but to take pleasure from the process of making it, as well.

At the beginning of this year, Kool-Aid launched a new beverage aptly named "Kool-Aid Magic Twists." The product changes colors when water is added and, as yet another surprise or twist, tastes drastically different than the color would suggest.

"Our Changin' Cherry starts as a green powder that turns into a blue drink when water is added, but it actually tastes like red cherry," said Mike Faherty, senior brand manager for Kool-Aid.

"What this new product does is leverage the whole trend of kids looking for more experiential involvement with products and interaction with everything they do. Now, more than just enjoying the flavor of Kool-Aid, they can help their parents make it and have a fun experience while doing it."

Along with Changin' Cherry, the company also created Grape Illusion, which begins as a gold drink mix that turns into a red drink when water is added, but tastes like grape. Although Kool-Aid already has a grape-flavored drink, Faherty said it's the surprise change that makes the product so enticing to children.

Each year, Kool-Aid comes out with several new flavors of drink to offer a wider variety of products for its consumers. Several years ago, the manufacturer noticed that adult consumers were becoming more interested in tea and, consequently, a new line of tea-flavored fruit drinks were born.

"A few years back, a lot of adults began drinking tea and we wanted to make sure we capitalized on that trend as well," said Faherty. "Even though our Kool-Aid is mostly consumed by kids, a lot of adults drink it, too, and we wanted to offer a powdered drink that catered specifically to these adults.

"But, since kids like to drink what the adults are drinking, we knew they would be interested in it, too."

Faherty saids that while its core consumers are kids, the company always considers the taste preferences of adults and any trends in older consumers as well, since they are the people who ultimately make purchase decisions.