Heineken UK is launching a new zesty innovation from the nation’s favourite cider brand, Strongbow, with Strongbow Zest (ABV 4 %). Available across grocery, wholesale and convenience channels from June, Strongbow Zest is rolling out now in 4x440ml and 500ml formats, and in time for the summer in 10x330ml.
Commanding a 21 per cent market share in the total cider category, Strongbow is the number one cider brand in the total market in volume and value sales. Strongbow Zest joins a range of innovative flavours – including the infamous Dark Fruit – to offer more choice and recruit new consumers into the cider category.
Strongbow Zest is a thirst-quenching apple cider carefully blended with lime, lemon and orange flavours. The zesty mix of limes, lemons, and oranges brightens up the classic crisp apply-ness for a fresh citrusy taste. The new flavour contains no artificial flavours, sweeteners, or colours, and is suitable for vegan diets, plus it’s gluten-free.
Rachel Holms, Cider Brand Director at Heineken UK, says, “We’re excited to launch Strongbow Zest into the market ahead of the Cider season. Through the launch, our ambition is to continue to recruit new consumers into the cider category, particularly those who are on the hunt for fresh innovation and new flavour experiences.
“Last year, we launched Strongbow Tropical into the market, which was crowned Product of the Year and the number one cider innovation in 2023, so we know there is an appetite for new flavours in the category. We recommend retailers stock up now to take advantage of summer sales.”
Around since 1963, Strongbow has gone from strength-to-strength and enjoys cult status for its range of flavours and iconic advertising. The launch of Strongbow Zest will be supported by a £10m marketing campaign from May. Whatever the occasion, Strongbow can offer a cider to deliver unbeatable refreshment. The latest innovation joins a roster of flavours including Strongbow Original, Strongbow Rose, Strongbow Dark Fruit, Strongbow Cloudy Apple and Strongbow Tropical.
Imperial Brands has announced a new pouch size for its best-selling premium Golden Virginia Original hand-rolling tobacco.
As well as the established 30g and 50g sizes, Golden Virginia Original will now for the first time also be available in a 40g pouch, on sale with an RRP of £33.70. The move is a response to continued price inflation and pressures on the cost of living, with consumers more than ever seeking both quality and value in everything they buy, and willing to try new options which they see as offering those attributes.
It follows other 40g pouch size introductions across the market in response to the financial challenges facing many individuals and households under continued difficult economic conditions.
Yawer Rasool, Consumer Marketing Director UK & Ireland at Imperial Brands, explained, “There is enormous loyalty towards the Golden Virginia Original brand, and the 40g pouch size has been introduced to provide increased options for Golden Virginia customers to enjoy their favourite rolling tobacco at a more affordable cost, without compromising on the quality they expect and are used to.
Introduced in 1877, Golden Virginia brings together 20 separate fine tobacco grades, sourced from four continents, to deliver a unique taste, and is widely recognised for its quality and value. Over more than 150 years, it has secured an enviable position in the UK and Ireland market as both a preferred choice for established hand-rolling tobacco users and for those opting for hand-rolling tobacco instead of cigarettes for the first time. Rolling papers are included with all pack sizes.
The annual Coca-Cola Christmas Truck Tour is back, bringing the magic of the season to towns and cities across Great Britain
This year, the Coca-Cola Truck Tour focuses on the ambition to make kindness travel. Echoing the wider Coca-Cola Christmas campaign message, “The World Needs More Santas”, the tour will encourage visitors to embrace their inner Santa and share an act of kindness with others during the festive season.
Promising to be bigger and better than ever before, for every person that attends the Coca-Cola Christmas Truck Tour, the equivalent of a meal will be donated on their behalf. Coca-Cola aims to donate the equivalent of up to a total of one million meals via FareShare this festive season.
“We are so grateful to Coca-Cola for their continued support for FareShare," said Kirsty Ford, Head of Fundraising at FareShare. "These invaluable donations help us get good-to-eat food to the people who need it rather than going to waste. Every day, the food we redistribute to a network of over 8,000 charities in every region helps to strengthen communities. Coca-Cola’s generous support for FareShare is instrumental in helping people affected by the cost-of-living crisis. This support means charities can unite more people through food to form connections and access essential support services. Thank you for helping FareShare make the food go further.”
This year’s Coca-Cola Christmas campaign will also see the Coca‑Cola Christmas Truck make its familiar festive appearance on TV screens in November. This year’s advert will launch with a new twist. For the first time, Coca-Cola will introduce an AI-generated interpretation of the classic advert, with a fusion of human creativity and advanced technology ushering in the start of the Christmas season.
Coca-Cola will also unveil a new festive digital AI experience, enabling people to engage in magical conversations with Santa or a snow globe avatar to create a personalised, shareable snow globe animation, based on a personal memory by scanning the QR code on a Christmas bottle or can of Coca-Cola.
Festive on-pack graphics and promotion Between 7th November and 2nd January, shoppers can enter a free prize draw via the Coca-Cola App by scanning QR codes on festive-themed cans and bottles of Coca-Cola Original Taste and Coca-Cola Zero Sugar. They will find out instantly if they’ve won one of thousands of £50 shopping vouchers*.
The limited-edition packs feature eye-catching festive designs with Santa graphics and decorations to help create a sense of Christmas magic in stores.
Convenience retailers can maximise the occasion by accessing festive Coca-Cola branded point of sale materials from My.CCEP.com now.
"Last year, soft drinks delivered its biggest ever year, with Coca-Cola the soft drink of choice for more than 10m households," said Rob Yeomans, vice-president, commercial development at Coca-Cola Europacific Partners (CCEP) GB.
“Coca-Cola is synonymous with Christmas thanks to the iconic campaigns and Truck Tour that consumers look forward to every year. Our new limited-edition packs and shopping voucher giveaway will help retailers build on that excitement and offer their customers a chance to win something to support with the cost of Christmas.
“Our aim is to spread Christmas spirit, and bring people together to create special Christmas celebrations at home. We’d encourage retailers to make the most of the opportunities that Christmas brings, such as by creating cross-category displays in store and using occasion led messaging at fixture, which can help double shopper engagement and increase sales.”
Nomadic has launched "Power Pots", its latest foray into protein-rich products and the company’s fourth launch of 2024. The duo of flavours - Chocolate Brownie and Smooth Caramel – feature a combination of vanilla yogurt with granola, plus chocolate brownie or caramel pieces.
Each pot features 20g of protein, plus 100 per cent of daily vitamin D and gut-friendly cultures, which all support immunity. This ‘trifecta’ of ingredients ticks an important box for Nomadic’s core consumers, which it describes as ‘hard-working busy people on the go’ – and who want satisfying, filling, foods which don’t compromise on taste.
And it’s a focus on taste that has driven the company’s choice of flavours with Smooth Caramel and Chocolate Brownie – effectively layering indulgence on top of the functional benefits of these products.
Power Pots appear in a similar format as the company’s best-selling Yogurt and Oat Clusters – which have helped Nomadic maintain its position as the No.1 Chilled Yogurt & Desserts brand in Convenience (Circana, 12 w/e 4/8/24, Chilled Yogurts and Protein Desserts, Total Convenience). As per usual, each pot also features a convenient wooden spoon.
“These are another part of our line-up that neatly combines ‘power’ – protein, gut health and vitamin D - with great taste," said Michelle Bloom, Nomadic’s marketing manager. "We’re sure these will be a big hit with hard-working consumers looking for both function and flavour.”
KTC Edibles Ltd (KTC), the UK’s largest supplier of edible oils, has launched Super High-Oleic Frying Oil, a traceable high-performance and long-life frying oil.
HOPO is blended using 100% traceable, organic, carbon-neutral RSPO Certified Sustainable Identity Preserved (IP) high oleic palm oil sourced directly from Daabon, a global leader in sustainable agriculture. KTC Super Hi Oleic can be offered with full traceability back to Daabon’s CI Tequendama SAS mill in Northern Colombia, providing complete visibility and zero deforestation guarantees - all the data customers need to comply with their obligations under the new European Union Deforestation Regulation (EU DR).
DAABON’s carbon-neutral organic palm oil has a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) calculated CO2eq of -977kg per tonne, cradle to gate. The LCA was conducted using Ecopalma’s carbon footprint estimation tool, harmonised with the ISO 14067 standard.
This traceability offers other sustainability benefits, allowing customers to calculate their Scope 3 emissions - and because it’s sourced from Daabon, a global leader in sustainable agriculture, it can be an effective way for companies to reduce the carbon footprint of their frying operations.
Gary Lewis, Sales Director at KTC Edibles, explains, "Super Hi Oleic offers the gold standard in sustainable, high-performance, long-life frying oils. We believe in offering consumers innovative new products that not only meet their culinary needs but also align with their values and sustainability goals. This is a giant leap forward in the industry, and we're proud to be at the forefront of positive change."
The high oleic palm oil used in the product also offers some unique performance advantages. It has higher oxidative stability and smoke point, lower PUFAs (Polyunsaturated Fatty Acids) and saturated fats than standard oils. The non-GMO, non-additive formula also provides a long shelf life, a well-balanced fatty acid profile and neutral taste attributes, ensuring it can be blended with other vegetable oils for premium performance at competitive prices.
Created using a natural, non-GMO hybrid of a standard African palm tree and a native Latin American palm tree, high oleic palm oil offers significantly higher crop yields than standard palm. It also requires manual pollination leading to additional employment, helping boost the local economy - the costs of which are offset by the higher yields.
Super Hi Oleic Frying Oil is the latest addition to KTC's range of certified sustainable, traceable and responsibly sourced palm oil products for bakery, food manufacturers and fryers in the UK.
TRIP, the UK’s fastest-growing soft drinks brand for the past two years, is excited to announce the launch of its new Magnesium Gummies.
After taking the market by storm with its award-winning range of functional Mindful Blend drinks, which were its most successful launches ever on Amazon, TRIP is continuing its mission to help people find calm and enjoy the benefits of magnesium in a new and convenient way. The gummies are available for purchase on the TRIP website for £19.60 and soon on Amazon, with plans for wider retail distribution in the coming months.
Boasting a remarkable +389 per cent CAGR over the past two financial years, the brand continues to disrupt the wellness space with innovative products that meet the needs of the modern consumer. In line with TRIP's commitment to quality and taste, these gummies are vegan-friendly, contain no added sugar, and deliver a delicious, juicy Wild Berry flavour experience worthy of their Great Taste award-winning heritage.
Magnesium is fast becoming one of the most talked-about wellness ingredients, with over 1 billion views of the #magnesium tag on Tiktok3 as people seek natural ways to manage fatigue and improve their overall well-being. This surge in popularity is partly fueled by recent trends like the “sleepy girl mocktail,” which combines magnesium and tart cherry juice as a pre-bedtime ritual, and wider recognition of its numerous health benefits, including:
Supporting the normal functioning of the nervous system
Promoting normal energy-yielding metabolism
Helping to reduce tiredness and fatigue
TRIP's Magnesium Gummies are designed to seamlessly integrate into consumers' daily wellness routines, whether as a standalone supplement or in combination with the brand's popular Mindful Blend drinks.
Olivia Ferdi, TRIP Founder, says, “I launched TRIP to help people find their calm in the everyday chaos - with a focus on authentically functional and uniquely delicious products that people love. Building on our mission & Following the overwhelming success of our Mindful Blend drinks, we recognised a growing demand from our community asking us for ways to incorporate new and powerful ingredients into their daily routines.
"We pride ourselves on innovation and expertise crafting the highest quality functional ingredients into award winning delicious formats. We wanted to offer our customers even more ways to find calm in their busy lifestyles, and our new gummies provide just that - a tasty and convenient option for those wanting the health benefits of magnesium without compromising on flavour or quality.”