Baking & Snack - May 2015 - 55

Social media is also a mainstay of promotion at
Dave's Killer Bread (DKB), Milwaukie, OR, with
a Facebook page boasting 166,000 likes. Daniel P.
Letchinger, product manager at Dave's, said the company is not marketing to any particular demographic
group by design.
In announcing the introduction of its new bread
varieties - White Bread Done Right and Sprouted
Whole Grains - DKB said it is scaling rapidly to
meet demand from consumers across the nation.
Kroger retailers in the Midwest and Fairway Market
stores in New York City and the Tri-State area are the
latest additions. The company's products also may be
ordered on its online store and via Amazon Fresh.
The addition of white bread to DKB's roster of more
than 15 whole grain varieties was a carefully considered decision, according to Mr. Letchinger. "We put
a lot of thought into this introduction," he said. "We
wanted a white bread that was demonstrably different
than others and was a DKB product. We started with
a white bread that had whole grains. Most have none.
Ours has 10 g. It has no bleached flour or HFCS." In
addition to wheat flour, the DKB white bread features
flour milled from quinoa, spelt, rye, millet and barley.
It contains 120 mg omega-3 fatty acids per slice.

Global health
This theme of healthfulness carried global echoes in
recent remarks by Daniel Servitje, CEO, Grupo Bimbo
S.A. de C.V, Mexico City. "It was an important year for
health and wellness initiatives," he said. "We launched
numerous better-for-you and functional products across
our 22 markets."
He described better-for-you as a rapidly growing
segment for Bimbo to address.
"Everything from whole grains, natural ingredients
and high fiber, to low fat and less sodium and sugar,"
he said. "It's about new formulas, newer ingredients
and alternative portion sizes, all leveraging our brand
equity. Our portfolio innovations started its transformations in this sense, and we are at an important
milestone toward a bright future in this huge market."
Toward the development and introduction of these
products, Mr. Servitje described how Bimbo balances
its global capabilities with a "highly localized" aspect
to its research and development.
"Technologies, trends, guidelines - our new products benefit from our global scale and cross-market
know-how," he said. "But local flavors and preferences,
and obviously local marketing and advertising, are critical to meeting the unique needs of our customers and
consumers in all the markets we operate."
While IRI has yet to consolidate its vendor listings

for Bimbo Bakeries USA
(BBU) into a single
company, each of the
Bimbo-related companies experienced sales
declines in the 52 weeks
ended Feb. 22 - Earthgrains,
down 4.4% in dollar sales;
Bimbo, down 0.4%; Arnold,
down 6% and Orograin,
down 10%.
Yet BBU's flagship
Sara Lee brand recorded a dollar sales gain of
1.2% with unit sales up
4.3%. Its smaller Arnold
brand was up 9% in dollar
sales. Losing ground were
Brownberry, down 10%
(dollar); Oroweat, down
4.2%; Mrs Baird's, down
7%; and Sara Lee Soft and
Smooth, down 13%.

More variety
Over the course of the last
year, Rudi's Organic Bakery
gained new ownership,
when the Boulder, CObased company was acquired in May 2014 by The
Hain Celestial Group, Inc.
Hain estimated Rudi's annual
Rudi's Organic Bakery
sales at $60 million per year.
Just before the acquisition, Rudi's rolled out seven recently rolled out seven
new products, including two gluten-free sandwich new gluten-free varieties.
bread varieties - double fiber sandwich bread and
deli style sandwich bread. The new varieties extended a
gluten-free lineup that already included original, multigrain and cinnamon raisin.
The heightened importance the gluten-free line
may be playing at Rudi's was suggested in brief comments about Rudi's offered by Irwin Simon, chairman
and CEO of Hain.
"We've spent some time getting the bakery up to
speed," Mr. Simon said at the 2015 annual conference
of the Consumer Analyst Group of New York. The presentation was delivered in March in Boca Raton, FL.
"We've put capital in the bakery," he said. "The
opportunity for frozen gluten-free, for fresh glutenfree products around the US, not only at retail but
also foodservice, is tremendous, along with organic
breads. Not just gluten-free products, but organic

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