It’s no secret that the snack food market isn’t just about greasy potato chips and candy bars anymore. With the growth of the natural and better-for-you industries, people now have the option of choosing pita chips, fruit-and-nut bars, and other baked, low-sodium, all-natural versions of the munchies they love.

Supermarket checkout aisles have seen the change as $4 organic chocolate bars compete alongside Milky Ways, and now there’s another platform for this next generation of snack foods.

Healthy vending machines — sounds like an oxymoron, doesn’t it? Well, that’s what folks are calling the new outposts cropping up at hospitals, college campuses and health clubs across the country. Capitalizing off consumers’ desire to eat better without sacrificing snacking, companies have come out with eye-catching new machines that hold products like 100% juice, dried fruit and rice cakes. There are also organic and all-natural varieties of indulgent favorites, too, like sandwich cookies and gummi bears.

So maybe “healthy” doesn’t apply across the board, since sugar and calories can still be found en masse in some products. But hey, that’s the business these days. Putting apples and oranges behind Plexiglas isn’t going to generate sales, and it won’t drive awareness. You have to meet consumers half way.

And sales have been good lately for companies like Vend Natural, based in Ventura, California. Formerly involved in the traditional vending industry, president Gil Sanchez made the transition a couple years ago and now has more than 350 machines across the country. more

If we look back over the past ten years, is there a food that stands out as the one that defined us? To Harry Balzer there is. Balzer, who’s vice president of the NPD Group, has been following the food industry for more than thirty years. He’s seen trends come and go, and he’s not one to come to any quick or easy conclusions.

His answer: Yogurt.

I first heard Balzer make this assessment on National Public Radio recently. So I decided to give him a call to learn more.

“We started off with about 17% of all Americans eating yogurt in 2000, and we end the decade with something like 28% consuming yogurt on a regular basis,” he said. “No other category has seen that kind of increase in the absolute number of people using the product.”

There are many reasons why we love yogurt: It’s portion controlled, it’s convenient, it can be customized with any number of interesting flavors, and there’s no cleanup afterward.

There’s also, Balzer said, “that wonderful health halo surrounding it.” Indeed, yogurt, a pretty healthy snack on its own, has quickly become a delivery system for all sorts of health benefits, from probiotics to fiber to protein. more

‘Twas two days before Christmas,

and all through the stores,

an acquisition was brewing,

that the principals promised

will open new doors….

OK, I’m not Clement Clarke Moore, but it seems an appropriate way to announce the news this morning that Kehe Food Distributors has acquired Tree of Life from Royal Wessanen nv.

The agreement, worth $190 million cash, includes Tree of Life U.S., based in St. Augustine, Fla., and Tree of Life Canada, which operates out of Calgary, Alberta. An early 2010 closing date is expected.

The development itself isn’t a total surprise. Earlier this year, Wessanen officials said they were going to start shopping their North American holdings in order to realign their portfolio and return to a Euro-centric business model. Wessanen, headquartered in the Netherlands, purchased Tree of Life in December of 1985 when it launched a push into the natural/organics business.

Tree of Life currently operates 10 distribution centers in the United States and three in Canada. Kehe, based in Romeoville, Ill., is a leading distributor of specialty, gourmet and ethnic products to retail grocery stores of all sizes in all 50 states, as well as Mexico and the Caribbean. more

The $4 billion food bar category is dominated by functional options. Look at any snack aisle or checkout display and you’ll see energy bars, breakfast bars, nutrition bars — and nowadays, even pregnancy bars.

To stand out from the crowd, some companies have gone back to the drawing board to focus a different, completely radical concept: taste.

“People say they’re looking for all sorts of things in a bar, but when it comes down to it they want to enjoy eating it,” said Frankie Whitman, vice president of marketing at Full Bloom Baking Company, a wholesale baking business based in Newark, California.

It was this thought that led Full Bloom and others to develop “artisan” bars that emphasize unique, gourmet ingredients and a handmade style of production. This fall, Full Bloom released a 12-grain toasted oatmeal bar. The company is also working on a cranberry almond bar made with ancient grains, and a bacon cornflake bar. That’s right, a bacon cornflake bar. more

A dispatch from Julie Gallagher, who edits the Center Store/Beverage section in Supermarket News, and is a regular contributor to our at-show blog, Total Access:

At this year’s Kosherfest a panel of supermarket buyers and specialty distributors bestowed best-in-show honors on Manhattan-based Luck Chen for its heat-and-serve noodle bowls.

What may have been viewed as a major coup in the past, given the product’s ethnic roots, is now par for the course. Especially considering that U.S. buyers have 120,000 kosher products to choose from, four in ten supermarket items are kosher and about 5,000 new foods introduced so far this year, have been, you guessed it, kosher.

The designation has become so mainstream that as I perused the show floor yesterday I had to remind myself of the common thread tying such varied products together. Take for instance Organic Batter Blasters, which is pancake batter in a whip cream can suitable for “lightening fast breakfasts on the go.” Its maker seems to have covered several bases here given the product’s appeal to convenience-seekers, kosher keepers and organic consumers. It remains to be seen how organic shoppers will react to the pressurized can.

Then there is a new microwavable treat from Spain: tunafish pizza in a an ice cream cone-shaped crust touted as “the new way of eating pizza.” Don’t worry about balancing the cone for heating, apparently its box is microwavable too.

The makers of Vinegar Splash Smart Fries air-popped potato sticks were also on hand. The 110-calorie-per-serving treats contain 80% less fat than potato chips, and are free of cholesterol, sugar and trans fat.

Also featured at the show was Sheer Bliss All Natural Gourmet Pomegranate ice cream in a tin can. Its package helps it maintain its integrity better than a carton could, according to its enthusiastic promoter. Publix and Whole Foods are among the retailers who’ve picked up the product.

I wish I could take credit for the phrase used in the headline, but it came from a story I spotted in the Philadelphia Inquirer this week about a burgeoning eco-kosher movement that seems to have its roots in the City of Brotherly Love.

Eco-kosher! Now, what the heck does that mean? Kosher food is already popular with non-Jews who like the sanitary and processing standards that govern the ancient law of Kashrut. Food prepared under kosher supervision is said to be cleaner, and therefore, more healthful.

Such beliefs have propelled sales of all kosher foods in the United States to new highs. According to Packaged Facts, sales of certified kosher foods in the supermarket channel topped $200 billion in 2008, up from $150 billion in 2003. Countless numbers of supermarkets serving large Orthodox populations have set up kosher delis, meat departments and bakeries – including Wakefern/ShopRite, Supervalu’s Jewel-Osco banner, Whole Foods (pictured) and Safeway-owned Genuardi’s, to name a few.

Kosher covers the processing and preparation of food, but it does not yet include the fairly new concepts of sustainable agriculture, worker welfare and all the other intangibles that increasingly make up the whole health movement.

“The emphasis now is on what it really means for a particular food to be fit to eat,” Mark Kaplan, a Reform Jew who has helped start community-supported agriculture programs with synagogues, told the Inquirer. more

It seems the butterscotch-infused chunk shortbread dunking biscuits have given way to more, er, pedestrian indulgences, if the reports from several sources attending this year’s Fancy Food Show in New York this week are correct.

One of our very own editors, Julie Gallagher, interviewed a number of retailers on the floor. They seemed to be looking for cheese (and accompaniments like crackers). Cheese is always one of the key categories that move at the show, but this year is seems to be enjoying even more popularity.

This might be because more people are entertaining at home, and, blah-blah-blah…. You’ve heard the recession-related verbiage.

Another of our editors, Carol Angrisani, noted a few common threads running among the winners of the Sofi awards honoring outstanding food innovation. There’s blood orange as an ingredient, salt/chocolate combinations and chip foods — as in roasted coconut chips. They can be healthy and indulgent, which is something I like to see.

The NY Daily News visited the show and noted a focus on portion control (smaller sizes, anyway) and less-haughty foods. It’s worth mentioning if only for the headline: “The fancy food fest is more like skid roe this year.” The pun refers to the level of interest being shown in caviar from less-expensive sources, like the hackleback, a relative of the sturgeon.

Nevertheless, the show is packed, as usual. It’s a fun show and there are plenty of products that ingeniously blend gourmet and wellness (olive oil is just the start). And if the gourmet factor is being downplayed this year, so be it. If anything that means it might have a better chance of showing up in conventional, everyday supermarkets.

(Photo credit: craigemorsels)

When the economy bottomed out last year, we saw a lot of folks rushing to develop additional comfort foods like pot pies and decadent mac and cheese. However, over the past few months, I’ve been watching a new trend in the store brands category sprout: The rise, once again, of ethnic foods.

The interest in foreign flavors and textures roams the world, but right now the most attention is being paid to Asian meal solutions, primarily Indian and Thai. There are frozen meals for an authentic nosh; simmer sauces for the speed scratch cook — you know, those who want to say they made it themselves, but don’t have the time or know-how to truly execute a dish from scratch; canned exotic fruits, vegetables and condiments to be used by the stalwart home cooks who insist on creating a version of their restaurant favorites; even authentic pantry staples, such as basmati and jasmine rice, couscous, quinoa and other assorted grains.

It wasn’t easy to find such food items, and sales were pretty much limited to small, neighborhood ethnic markets or natural food retailers like Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s. Lucky for average consumers of all stripes, the horizon is broadening to include club stores, traditional supermarkets, convenience stores, drug stores and even deep discounters. more

American consumers will soon start to see more products labeled Fair Trade. A lot more. This week Transfair USA, the only independent certifier for Fair Trade in the U.S., announced it would expand to include all products covered by Europe’s largest certifier, Fairtrade Labeling Organizations International.

New categories include fresh fruits and vegetables, nuts, olive oils and spices. There’s also one labeled “sportsballs” (anyone?). Altogether, more than two dozen products will be added for Fair Trade certification in the U.S.

“Now, with public awareness of Fair Trade Certified high, the time is right for us to allow U.S. consumers access to more Fair Trade Certified products,” said Paul Rice, CEO of TransFair, in a statement.

Indeed, this outgrowth is the logical next step for a program that’s been growing in leaps and bounds since debuted in the U.S. ten years ago. Now it’s a nearly $1 billion industry that has a solid reputation for environmental sustainability and helping workers in developing countries.

Especially in this economy, with products typically cheaper than organic yet still conveying the sort of wellness message that shoppers are looking for, Fair Trade seems poised to excel.

We’ve told you about a number of specialty stores that have opened up in the past few years, all of them devoted to a particular area of health and wellness. Remember those low-carb stores around L.A. that offered nothing but bars?

These days there are stores dedicated to local foods, allergen-free foods and gluten-free foods. The restricted-diet shops, in particular, fill a niche in the overall retail food spectrum, but they do play a critical role satisfying consumers who are newly diagnosed with a condition, and are seeking guidance and support as they go about changing their shopping habits.

Somehow, these small operators seem to be more approachable — at least initially. Maybe it’s the intimacy or the way these stores are staffed. Consumers with diet-related maladies often come to these outlets first before realizing they can find most of the same products (usually for much less) at their conventional supermarket.

Still, no retailer rolls out a welcome like this: The Simply Gluten Free Specialty Grocery Store — opening this week in Thousand Oaks, Calif. — offers three sizes of “Just Diagnosed” gift baskets, ranging in size from small to large, and in price from $50 to $150. Each is filled with brand name gluten-free products that surely remind the receiver that their days of eating cookies, cakes and snacks is not over.

It’s a neat way of making someone on a special diet feel… well, special.