Kraft Heinz doubles down on innovation with new chip and sauce dips

Dive Brief:

• Kraft Heinz launched Heinz Dip & Crunch, a product that offers consumers the ability to dip their burgers into a sauce and then chips. The two-in-one packaging includes a container of tomato-based burger sauce and another tub containing crisp potato crunchers. It is available in original and spicy flavors.
• Heinz Dip & Crunch is available at grocers nationwide including Walmart, Meijer, Target and Giant. The company first tested the product at Jack in the Box locations on the West Coast earlier this year.
• As CPGs look to remain competitive against other large competitors and scrappy upstarts, companies such as Kraft Heinz are looking for new and creative ways to meet consumer needs and provide a fresh experience.

Dive Insight:

Since Kraft Heinz CEO Miguel Patricio took the helm in 2019, the company has prioritized innovation to better meet broader consumer needs. The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the move toward snacking, increased demand for well-established brands and increased how much people eat at home.

“We think that consumers are … rediscovering new occasions at home,” Sanjiv Gajiwala, Kraft Heinz’s U.S. chief growth officer, told Food Dive in 2020. “They’re rediscovering trusted brands that they hadn’t necessarily engaged with in quite some time, and I think they’re finding that those can have value in their lives.”

At Kraft Heinz’s investor day in 2020, Carlos Abrams-Rivera, its U.S. zone president, detailed how growth at the company could be driven by a new type of consumer: younger, higher income, diverse and living in smaller households without kids. The company made the decision to devote 60% of its R&D resources to new innovations.

The Dip & Crunch product symbolizes this approach. The product was inspired by a trend on TikTok where users dipped their burgers into different sauce and chip combinations, according to Fast Company. By listening to social media, Kraft Heinz was able to discover the value and function that consumers were assigning to its condiments and quickly respond with a product.  

Kraft Heinz has harnessed social media to inspire other new products. In 2018, the company launched Mayochup — combining ketchup with mayonnaise — after conducting a Twitter poll. Additional sauces blending mayonnaise with mustard and barbecue sauce then followed through internal development.

Other Kraft Heinz products that are timely responses to trends include a limited-time Macaroni & Cheese-flavored ice cream with Van Leeuwen, and a pink version of its mac and cheese for Valentine’s Day.

Dip & Crunch also reflects how Kraft Heinz’s embrace of data analytics can enable it to quickly respond to consumer trends. Most recently, the company partnered with Google to tap into AI and machine learning to guide the development of new flavors, formulations and products.