Meeting “plant forward” consumers: Landec hits 100 percent clean label target on Natural Foods portfolio

04 Jan 2019 --- Hot on the heels of Landec acquiring Yucatan Foods in a US$80 million deal last month, the plant-based foods innovator says all five brands in their Landec Natural Foods (LNF) portfolio now contain only 100 percent clean ingredients, including all salad dressings, toppings, sauces and dips. The company is seeking to keep pace with demand from “plant forward” consumers – people who are not necessarily vegan or vegetarian but prefer the majority of their meals to be plant-based.

In December 2018, Landec Corporation’s wholly-owned subsidiary, Apio, Inc., acquired Yucatan Foods, L.P, adding two leading guacamole brands, Yucatan and Cabo Fresh, to its portfolio of clean label plant-based brands. This accelerates the transformation of Landec’s packaged fresh vegetable business to a natural foods business, according to CEO Molly Hemmeter. 

And now the business strategy has been bolstered further as the entire portfolio of Landec’s “Eat Smart” branded products now contains only 100 percent clean ingredients. This includes Eat Smart fresh packaged vegetables and salads, O Olive Oil and Vinegar premium artisan products, Now Planting pure-plant meal solutions, and Yucatan and Cabo Fresh guacamole and avocado products.

Having 100 percent clean ingredients means there are no artificial dyes, flavors, preservatives, sweeteners or high fructose corn syrup. Currently, many non-organic salad kits, salad dressings and dips do not contain clean ingredients. This is despite the fact that clean ingredient labels are important to a growing number of consumers who look for the shortest list of recognizable ingredients when shopping for food.

Speaking to FoodIngredientsFirst, Hemmeter explains how this is a critical milestone in the transformation of Landec Natural Foods from a packaged, fresh vegetable business to a branded, natural foods business focused on clean label plant-based foods.

“It took Landec two to three years to reformulate our products to make sure they contained only 100 percent clean ingredients. Most of Landec’s vegetable products have always contained clean ingredients – because we use only fresh vegetables. However, we leverage dressings, salad toppings, sauces and dips from third parties in our salad kits and party trays to create products that make it easy and delicious for consumers to eat healthy food,” she says. 

“When we started requesting only clean ingredients, we found two primary challenges. The first was that many 100 percent clean ingredient products did not exist from our current vendors. Therefore, we took on the burden of developing our own solutions. We prioritized reformulating our products utilizing our own internal R&D resources. We then partnered with our vendors to commercialize these solutions. We committed that all branded products would contain only 100 percent clean ingredients by the end of 2018 – and we met this commitment,” Hemmeter explains.

The second challenge involved the management of a refrigerated supply chain. By removing artificial preservatives in these products, their shelf-life decreased. “Fresh products require an efficient, refrigerated supply chain,” she adds. 

“We needed to improve the accuracy of our forecasting, reduce the amount of inventory we carried and move it more rapidly through our national, refrigerated supply chain. Our rapid, refrigerated logistics network ensures that our products make it to the consumer in the freshest state possible,” Hemmeter continues. 

The objective of LNF is to provide clean ingredient, plant-based foods to as many people as possible, in a way that preserves and protects our planet, notes Hemmeter. 

Using its own proprietary research, the company found that 17 percent of US consumers and 23 percent of Canadian consumers consider themselves “plant-forward.” 

“Being ‘plant-forward’ does not necessarily require you to be vegan or vegetarian, rather that you prefer approximately 70 percent of your meals to contain plant-based ingredients. We have positioned LNF to deliver consumers at the intersection of these two trends – plant-based and 100 percent clean ingredients,” Hemmeter adds. 

"People deserve to buy fresh foods without worrying about whether or not the ingredients are all natural. Consumers can now purchase products within the LNF brand portfolio without needing to study the label. They can trust that our branded products contain only 100 percent clean ingredients.”

By Gaynor Selby