Sargento Foods is taking a focused approach to new product development (NPD), with the US dairy company looking to build innovation around its existing strengths in cheese rather than pursuing every emerging food trend.
Holly Baumgart, Sargento’s SVP for innovation, discussed the company’s NPD strategy with just-food, highlighting how the business evaluates consumer trends while staying connected to its core capabilities.
Innovation Starts With Core Capabilities
Rather than treating innovation as an exercise in following every market trend, Sargento’s approach starts by identifying where the company already has expertise and then determining how those strengths can address changing consumer needs.
For a dairy processor, this strategy places product expertise, manufacturing capabilities and consumer relevance at the centre of NPD decisions.
Protein Becomes an Important Consumer Trend
The company’s innovation agenda is also being shaped by growing interest in protein, alongside changing consumer behaviour associated with GLP-1 weight-loss medications. The trend is creating opportunities for dairy companies to highlight the protein credentials of established dairy categories while developing products that align with evolving dietary priorities.
For cheese manufacturers, the opportunity is not simply about adding new products. It is also about communicating the nutritional and functional attributes of existing products in ways that respond to changing consumer expectations.
Faster NPD Without Losing Dairy Expertise
The Sargento approach highlights a wider challenge for dairy processors: balancing speed of innovation with manufacturing expertise and brand positioning.
As consumer preferences evolve rapidly, dairy companies are increasingly looking at how established categories such as cheese can participate in trends including protein, convenience and changing eating habits without moving too far away from their core strengths.
For the wider dairy industry, Sargento’s strategy illustrates how focused innovation can connect established dairy capabilities with emerging consumer demand, rather than treating every trend as a reason to enter a new category.
Source: Dairynews7x7 15 Sep, 2026 Read full story here
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