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Healthy Baby Bites

Great ingredients (organic everything), innovative production (tasty frozen foods), new packaging (convenient squeeze pouches) and fuller-flavored recipes (some from  celebrity chefs) have made food for the under-four set more exciting and satisfying.

By Nicole Potenza Denis

Twenty-five years ago, twins in Vermont recognized the need for a better baby food. But they did more than just spot the niche, they created an entirely new category. Brothers Arnie and Ron Koss founded Earth’s Best Baby Food and launched the first organic baby food to sit beside mainstream competitors on national supermarket shelves. Today, grocers nationwide stock baby and toddler specialty food products that reflect the Koss’ entrepreneurial spirit and organic ideology. According to the 2010 NASFT/Specialty Food Magazine State of the Specialty Food Industry Report, between 2007 and 2008 there were more than 40 new product introductions in the baby and toddler food category—and that number continues to grow.

“The organic baby/toddler category has evolved to become nothing short of amazing,” says Arnie Koss. “The choices consumers have to meet their diverse needs and preferences rival that of the best buffets out there.”

THE CHALLENGES OF IMPROVING BABY FOOD

While Earth’s Best got the ball rolling, it took a while for others to make a go of it in the market. There were obstacles around selling organic foods, but there were production challenges as well.

“The complexity and barriers to entering the commercial baby food business are higher than for any other food product category,” explains Ron Koss. Processing baby food requires that both high-acid (fruit juices and purées) and low-acid (vegetables) items be manufactured in the same facility. Adding to this challenge is the necessity to also process grains, dairy products and different meats in numerous ingredient combinations with diverse textures to meet the preferences of children at various stages of growth.

Earth’s Best helped build the market by championing a strict three-year transition standard for farm products to qualify as organic. The company’s purchasing power and interest in an array of certified-organic ingredients also stirred many growers to go organic, thereby providing enough produce to help fuel further growth.

But it was slow growth for years, which makes the options, ingredients and formats available today all the more exciting. There has been amazing progress in premium frozen baby food, innovative packaging and interesting ingredients across the board.

FIRST-CLASS FROZEN

Today, advances in the frozen category means that frozen baby and toddler meals offer fuller flavors and adult ingredient profiles. Happy Family Brands, which was founded in 2003 by Shazi Visram, a passionate supporter of health, wellness and sustainability, offers some interesting examples. The New York City-based company got its start with its Happy Baby frozen line of products. With ‘Think Out of the Jar’ as its tagline, the company launched frozen meals in cube form for six- and nine-plus-month-olds.

When Visram first began working on Happy Baby, she observed that parents could purchase $1,000 strollers and designer baby clothes, yet mainly only had processed food with a three-year shelf life as an option when it came to feeding their babies. “I knew at that time that the market was screaming for innovation to address the need for better quality and true nutrition,” she says.

Today, Visram offers specialty baby foods that include nutritious grains as well as some that incorporate exotic spices and herbs. The company uses organic free-range chickens, screens for nitrates in its vegetables, adds DHA (an Omega-3 fatty acid essential for brain and eye development) to many of its products and has ethnic flavor profiles that mimic the prose on restaurant menus. Its nine-plus-month Baby Dahl and Mama Grain, for example, has 32 milligrams of DHA, quinoa and antioxidant-rich spices such as cinnamon and coriander to boost a baby’s palate.

Malibu, Calif.-based Tastybaby uses entertaining product names like Corn in the USA, Bollywood Baby and Mama Mia and features organic ingredients such as butternut squash, quinoa pasta, sage and Parmesan cheese in its frozen line of baby and toddler food that is available in stages 1-3.

Newcomer Petite Select, a division of Nature’s Select Food Group in Miami, Fla., also focuses on distinctive ingredients, including Glatt kosher and organic meats. Offering a culinary taste of ‘around the world’ flavors for babies, Co-founder Ronit Cohen Bentolila began developing recipes after a frustrated search for eclectic food for her child. The result is organic, kosher, flash-frozen meals in BPA-free plastic and biodegradable paper tubs. They include Pasta Bolognese made with whole wheat pasta and Mango Jambo, a medley of mangoes, pears, bananas and Amaranth grain. “It is important to expand little ones’ palates so they are able to absorb different flavors later in life,” says Bentolila.

Members of the crawling set aren’t the only ones benefitting from palate-pleasing and healthier frozen meals. Toddlers, known for their finicky eating habits, have ‘TV dinner-like’ options, some with the allure of recognizable educational television characters to reel them in.

In 2002, Earth’s Best (bought by The Hain Celestial Group, Inc. in 2000) expanded into a Tots and Kidz line. In 2004, it was selected by Sesame Workshop to partner in its Healthy Habits for Life Initiative, an on-going campaign to help young children and their caregivers establish a foundation for healthful habits. The company launched its first Sesame products, fortified with iron, zinc and B vitamins, in the breakfast and snack categories. Products included Organic On-the-Go O’s cold cereal (Apple Cinnamon and Honey Nut) and Organic Yummy Tummy Instant Oatmeal (Maple & Brown Sugar and Apples & Cinnamon), as well as organic snacks. The line has now expanded to nutritional frozen breakfast foods and frozen meals for toddlers such as Elmo Mac ’n Cheese with vegetables and Elmo whole grain pizza. “Organics is a growing trend that can be seen as natural foods, grocery and mass-market retailers make more room on their shelves and in freezers for these types of products,” says Kim Bremer, senior marketing director of infant products, Hain Celestial Group. Bremer sees continued growth in organic baby food and a strong customer demand to extend into more toddler foods.

Picky kids 12 months and up who shun actual vegetables can get a dose from San Francisco, Calif. company Peas of Mind’s Puffet products. The all-natural hand-held meals come in Eat Your Greens (broccoli and spinach) and Carrot Risotto (carrots and sweet potatoes) and are ready in two minutes in the microwave. The company’s newest product, Veggie Wedgies, are gluten-free, baked crispy French fries made with broccoli, cauliflower, carrots or apples. The company claims that 14 fries contain more than a serving of fruits or vegetables recommended by the USDA.

PREMIUM POUCHES

Grocery aisles offer additional creative ingredients and products for young children. Plum Organics is a company that first made its name in frozen but has moved along to the next big thing—pouches. Started in 2005 by New York City mom Gigi Lee Chang, it is now producing its organic baby and toddler foods in BPA-safe pouches. The newest product, Training Meals, offers babies ages eight months and up chunky textures and bold flavor profiles. Culinary-inspired meals are designed to train babies’ palates for their next stages in life.

Celebrity chefs are getting in on the children’s food market with environmentally friendly, ingredient-centric, grab-and-go, shelf-stable pouches. Sprout Organic Baby Food, co-founded by Max MacKenzie and celebrity chef Tyler Florence, offers babies a menu of roasted fruits and vegetables. Selections include best-selling Peach Rice Pudding made with whole grain brown rice and organic spices such as cardamom and nutmeg, and Yukon Gold potatoes and summer squash with Parmesan cheese—all in BPA food-safe pouches that help to preserve the flavors and integrity of the food.

“Children have more taste buds than adults, and we believe that giving them healthy food that tastes good creates a positive association that will affect their food preferences as they grow,” says MacKenzie. The New York City-based Sprout stands out from its competitors by roasting and baking its fruits and vegetables  (“traditional baby food manufacturing involves boiling and steaming, which waters down the food and makes it become less nutrient-dense,” he says) as well as offering re-sealable pouches that close with a zipper-type seal. (Sprout also participates in giving used Sprout pouches a second life. It has partnered with eco-innovator TerraCycle, a company that converts waste packaging into fun and innovative packaging like bags, bows, kites and pencil cases.)

While the pouch meal category is growing for babies even faster than frozen meals, a flood of new shelf-stable fruit and vegetable purée products are infiltrating the market. These non-messy, convenient grab-and-go snacks offered in squeeze pouches—often filled with a mix of healthful organic fruits and/or vegetables—are popping up everywhere from specialty food shops and giant toy stores to online diaper retailers and even Starbucks. And they are coming up with a way to differentiate themselves from their competitors.

French company Materne—the first to launch pouch packaging in the applesauce category in the U.S.—introduced its no-sugar-added Apple Apple GoGo Squeez in 2008. The company has sold more than 1.3 billion pouches worldwide, and touts successful marketing, PR and social media outlets as part of its success. Materne began its growth in the natural foods outlets, “where shoppers are most likely to look for innovative and adventurous products that are healthy for their kids,” notes David Istier, vice president of marketing for Materne North America. It has now expanded rapidly with East Coast distribution and placement in Giant and Harris Teeter.

Two other international companies that have entered the market are both from the U.K.: Peter Rabbit Organics and Ella’s Kitchen. Founded in 2003, Peter Rabbit Organics launched its all-organic fruit purées in BPA-free, 3.5-ounce pouches in 2009 to U.S. consumers. With flavors like Apple & Grape and Mango, Orange & Banana that contain a large percentage of locally sourced fruits from the Northwest, the company offers one of the largest-sized fruit pouches available, suited for toddler-aged children. They also have prominent visibility in Starbucks stores nationwide. “Starbucks healthy food initiative is a perfect fit for our products and we are seeing a fantastic response from parents who are looking for healthier, grab-and-go snacks for their kids,” says Ben Ford, managing director for Peter Rabbit Organics.

Making their U.S. debut early last year in Babies ’R Us, Ella’s Kitchen products are blends of pasteurized organic fruits and/or vegetables in convenient squeeze pouches. The Stage One baby food creations, such as Carrot, Apple & Parsnip or Sweet Potato, Pumpkin Apple & Blueberries, plus Smoothie Fruits for toddlers like the Yellow One (a mix of bananas, apples, mangoes and apricot), were designed and named by kids.

Helping to distinguish her products from the array of pouch packs available, Happy Family’s Visram launched a HappyTot line last year. In addition to fruit and vegetable medleys like Spinach Mango Pear or Banana Peach Coconut and Prune, Visram incorporates salba into the recipe. “Salba is a grain rich in antioxidants, vitamins and minerals. It is also gluten-free and has a neutral taste so its application to baby food is truly unmatched,” she says. Visram plans to provide retailers with small signs showing the benefits of the salba grain to help drive awareness to the line.

SMARTER SNACKING

Babies’ first snack is often Cheerios®, but by the time they’re toddlers they’ve likely traded up for more exotic and tasty fare. “We have seen some interesting new products,” says Liz Hochberg, category manager for N.J.-based diapers.com, an online retailer that sells diapers, baby accessories and baby food. Hochberg says yogurt melts by both Gerber and Happy Baby are popular, as well as all the squeezable fruit coming on the market.

The snack category has grown to incorporate products that are not only texturally interesting but also nutritious. In 2004, Berkeley, Calif.’s Clif Bar Company, maker of organic energy and protein bars, extended its line to include Clif ZBaR, the first on-the-go USDA-certified-organic whole grain energy snack bar specifically for kids. Originally created for ‘tweens’ ages six-12, they have become popular with the three-and-up set. They are appropriately portioned and made narrow enough for young children to take small bites. Clif Kid Brand Director Jennifer Yun suggests they can be merchandised with other whole grain snacks like breads, healthful yogurts or with Clif’s Organic Twisted Fruit snacks—a chewy rope of fruit that offers one serving of fruit.

Yogurt and organic jelly-filled cereal and snack bars are taking the place of dry cereals on shelves. Revolution Food, Emeryville, Calif., offers kid-friendly varieties with playful names and packaging such as Grammy Sammy, a 100 percent whole grain, soft-baked graham snack filled with yogurt, and Jammy Sammys, which are filled with organic jam. Customers looking for gluten-free snack alternatives can turn to Plum Organics Plum Tots Fiddlesticks. Made with a blend of organic brown rice, tapioca and garbanzo bean flour and real fruits and vegetables, these soft-baked snacks dissolve into small bites and are easy to hold and chew for toddlers.

And, on the sneaky side of snacks, Nature’s Select Food Group has introduced Smart Cookie. Made from all-natural ingredients, the cookies disguise fruits and vegetables such as squash, carrots, cauliflower and beets. The Yellow Mellow is a chocolate chip cookie made with corn, cauliflower, squash and applesauce.

BETTER SALES AT RETAIL

With all of these options, the baby and toddler food shelves are getting crowded. So how should a busy retailer make the best use of the products? Smaller specialty stores can take advantage of the fact that on-the-go parents are always looking for something nutritious and easy to give their kids, opening up myriad possibilities for snack merchandising, especially at the register as an impulse buy.

The durability of pouch meals also makes them attractive. Sprout, for example, is sold individually at supermarkets and, according to MacKenzie, the portability and strength of the pouch enables this product to be sold in more places. “Stores are more willing to carry pouches because they risk less breakage,” he says. Hochberg from diapers.com is also a fan. “Pouch foods are both lighter weight and have less of a chance of breakage—both for shipping and for moms carrying them around in a diaper bag,” she says.

Retailers are also touting the portability and the price of some squeeze fruits. “Ella’s Kitchen is hitting on all cylinders with us,” says Roger McElroy, category specialist for Straub’s Market in Clayton, Mo. “It has innovative flavors and packaging, and it is organic and moderately priced. In this environment customers still buy on price, so that is important.” |SFM|

Nicole Potenza Denis is a contributing editor to Specialty Food Magazine.