Confectionery Comment: Sweet or savoury?

By Jill Sayles in Comment, Food & Confectionery, Latest News June 6, 2023 0

DFNI Confectionery Editor, Joe Bates delves into the sweet and savoury snacks travel retail market

Why do some people crave sweet treats and others salty snacks?

It's a fascinating question that occurred to me while writing our latest confectionery and food report.

One theory put forward by scientists is that those people who plump for potato chips and pretzels over cake and chocolate are actually ‘supertasters’ with more tastebuds on their tongues than others. For supertasters, choosing salty foods helps mask bitter flavours which they perceive more strongly.

One thing for certain is that people who prefer savoury snacks are poorly served by the typical travel retail offer where sweet invariably wins out over salty. In certain markets such as the Middle East savoury products are big money-spinners. At Dubai Duty Free, for instance, nuts accounted for 17% of the retailer's confectionery and food sales last year.

Elsewhere, however, sweet confectionery and chocolate rule the roost. Cereal and convenience food producer Kellogg's has hired travel retail research consultancy m1nd-set to do a study and this previously neglected topic. It discovered more consumers are looking for a global salty, healthy snacking product in travel retail.

Oftentimes, these consumers end up disappointed. Consequently, Kellogg's is looking to meet this unmet demand with a new travel-retail exclusive range of Pringle's stackable potato chips which will launch in January next year. The Pringle's range will comprise a 2 x 165g multipack, a 2 x 75g multipack and 165g tin cans.

Dark chocolate, which of course is much less sweet than milk, also continues to win converts. Rising health awareness among consumers has helped propel dark chocolate into a global US$48.1bn sub-category which is forecast to grow at CAGR of 7% over the next five years, according to a recent report by Expert Market Research. The trend towards dark is also apparent in travel retail– one of Belgian chocolate company Guylian's standout product lines in travel retail this year, for instance, has been its new Seashells Dark Praliné: a combination of Guylian's famous hazelnut praline recipe covered with 72% Belgian dark chocolate.

Another strand of the increasingly important better-for-you confectionery trend is the growing consumer awareness of the dangers of excess sugar consumption. According to a study by Belgian-Swiss chocolate company Barry Callebaut, almost half of North American consumers say they want chocolate to be low in sugar, up a staggering +17% versus two years ago. The sugar-free chocolate market in the US has doubled in the last five years and is now worth over US$260m.

Hershey World Travel Retail has responded to this trend by launching its sugar-free chocolate brand Lily's into travel retail. Hershey acquired Lily's in 2021 and the brand has grown by a very healthy CAGR of 64% in the US domestic market. With exciting products in the portfolio such as Sea Salt, Salted Caramel, Cookies & Crème and Blood Orange, Hershey believes will Lily's is well placed to thrive in travel retail where travellers are increasingly searching for indulgent yet healthy treats.