“More is better” is often the mantra when it comes to adding features to a new product. But sometimes savvy innovators may want to step back and consider a “less is more” strategy.
That’s what food and beverage maker Chobani did last fall when it reformulated its low sugar, fiber-packed, lactose-free, protein-rich yogurt drink Chobani Complete, as a Greek yogurt product renamed Chobani 15g, 20g, and 30g protein. The company eliminanated some of the elements of the yogurt drink, and zeroed in on its high-protein features.
Thierry Saint Denis, Senior Vice President of Research and Development for Chobani and sister brand La Colombe, recently spoke to InnoLead about the strategy behind the relaunch and how the product is having an impact on the company’s fortunes.
His Role
Thierry Saint Denis: Many food and beverage companies have [my] title and function. But for us, it’s really about transforming the ideas of the food and beverages we have in mind into actual food and beverages we will consume.
For example, food and beverage companies typically have their marketing and sales organizations collect consumer data and sales data, then brainstorm concepts and ideas of what the food should look like. R&D is typically involved at a later stage, receiving a brief from the marketing organization that says you should be developing a product that achieves these targets. Consumer tests are later done to make sure the concept works, and then a packaging and communication platform is created. It’s a sequential process in which food is one part of it.
But what we do is very different than my previous experience at other companies. We start with the food, and the rest follows. It is a very interesting way of putting the entire process upside down.
We only move forward with any project if we can develop a food or beverage that we literally love internally and can create genuine excitement inside the organization. After that, we do the rest of the work, which is cross-functional in nature, like deciding how we are going to make it, and which packaging and marketing strategies to use. We put the food first and foremost.
The Project
TSD: Five years ago, the team developed a drinkable yogurt called Chobani Complete, which had 20 grams of protein, low sugar, prebiotic fiber, vitamins, and minerals. It was almost like a meal replacement — something extremely nutritious that you could grab and go.
But customers didn’t realize it had a lot of protein in it.
By simplifying the product and naming it 15 grams protein, 20 grams protein, 30 grams protein Greek yogurt, we successfully relaunched the product. Those products now have no added sugar… and the space we are gaining by removing the fiber and some unnecessary elements allowed us to reinvest it into the taste and flavors…
Whenever we launch a product, we never stop working on it. There are always things we can improve. We literally go into supermarkets and ask people who are buying our product what they think about it. We also have our own feedback that we bring to the table, so we keep reiterating on all of our products all of the time.
Another example of this is we launched a new draft latte recipe with La Colombe a year ago in cans. Today, we are producing the sixth revision of that recipe, with small tweaks here and there.
When we design food and beverages, we are not designing them with a cost target or a margin target. At other companies I have worked for in the past, when a product is launched successfully, most companies would say, “What can I remove to save a bit of money and increase my margin?” That creates what I call the salami effect.
The salami effect is when you remove a thin slice, and it’s almost the same sausage. But then you remove another slice, and another slice, and after months and years, you’ve degraded the quality of your food…
The salami effect is when you remove a thin slice, and it’s almost the same sausage. But then you remove another slice, and another slice, and after months and years, you’ve degraded the quality of your food from what you offered initially. You are probably managing costs and affordability, while increasing margins, but at the expense of food quality.
I was almost shocked when I joined Chobani. We literally do the opposite of that. When we launch something, we say, “This is not good enough” and change it, even if it’s going to cost more. We believe the food quality should increase over time, not decrease.
How It Got Green-Lit
TSD: Our founder and CEO has a real passion for the food, the products, and the innovation process. When we start on an idea, the CEO is literally part of the conversation.
We’ll bring ideas to the CEO and discuss and dissect them with the entire C-suite and our development group to make them better. We’ll then reach a tipping point where we say there is space where we think we have a good idea, or we may say there is no space because sometimes the best thing we can do is just to stop working on an idea.
If there’s space for an idea, it’s important for us to quickly execute a mock-up of what the product could be. We literally bring forward a lot of tools and capabilities in a week or two, and say it could be something like this or like that, or we could make it much more interesting with new technology we’ve just developed, which allows us to produce even higher protein as part of a new fermentation process.
After conversations on what the platform could be and the criteria for success, and following many iterations and meetings, we reached the critical mass to say, “Okay, this looks to be a very good idea,” and received authorization to move it down to the rest of the organization, which formally starts the process of launching it into the marketplace.
The Three Biggest Challenges
TSD: The first challenge is that all the ingredients have to be natural. This automatically means our suppliers and partners have, more or less, 85 percent of their portfolio of ingredients that we cannot use because they do not fit our definition of natural and simple ingredients. That’s a big constraint because we’re working with a reduced toolbox.
The second challenge is how to get high protein in real yogurt using only fresh milk as the protein source, without relying on any powders to fortify it. That’s where our knowledge of the fermentation process comes into play, and the fact that we are making Greek yogurt, which concentrates the protein with our natural straining process that removes most of the sugar from the milk. Other companies are using protein powders, like whey protein concentrate and milk protein concentrate, which is fine if that’s their choice, but that’s not what we decided to do.
Another challenge is that we need space for the food, the flavors, and the freshness of the product. It’s a live and active product because it contains live and active cultures. So, it will evolve over time and throughout its shelf life, presenting an extra technical challenge. But high-protein yogurt isn’t the first yogurt we have ever made at the company, so we managed to solve all of those technical challenges in record time. And, as we speak, we already have ideas to make it better.
The Smartest Thing We Did to Set It Up For a Successful Launch
TSD: I think simplicity was really the name of the game. It’s a skill we have to develop. We always want to bring a lot of things to our products, but Chobani Complete was a case where there were too many things.
The smartest move was to force ourselves to be even simpler and literal in the food design and the way we name the food.
The smartest move was to force ourselves to be even simpler and literal in the food design and the way we name the food. Its name is as descriptive and literal as you can think of. It’s a Greek yogurt that will give you 20 grams of protein and is called Chobani 20g Protein.
I also think the simplicity of the design and packaging is very important. We don’t spend a lot of money on advertising. The real advertising we have is the quality of our food and how it looks on the shelf. We think the new design is striking, with its pictures of the real food we use in the yogurt, the dark blue background, and vivid white lettering. We had to clearly communicate that it’s a Chobani product.
Metrics We’re Tracking
TSD: When we launch a new product, we literally go into our local supermarkets and see how customers react. I knew my supermarket was getting our protein product, so I went with one of my team members to see how people were reacting to it and why they were attracted to it.
We usually spend an hour or two just to see how things are moving, how people react, how many are repeat customers, and answer their questions.
This product literally flew off the shelves in less than one hour at my local supermarket, which is usually a good sign, and we saw it repeat over and over across the country. One thing we didn’t do well was estimate demand. We are now rushing to produce as much as we can and are struggling to meet demand. That’s one thing we want to be better at the next time we work on an innovative product.
This product is probably one of the most successful product relaunches we’ve had at the company. We’ve had many successful products, but this one is really flying off the shelves at an incredible speed.
Featured image courtesy Chobani
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