When raw materials go up in any industry, eventually it's going to have an effect on any company's profitability.

In this case, the cost of wholesale food ingredients has gone up, and it's affecting General Mills profitability.

There are always a number of factors that cause price fluctuations, but in food ingredients it tends to be just a few things:

• weather
• demand
• fuel

Obviously, fuel costs get blamed in transportation costs to manufacturers and the consumer, but they also, of course, affect the cost to the farmer of planting, harvesting, and getting their product to market. Ultimately these things show up as higher prices to both food manufacturers and consumers.

Quoting a Reuter's article on General Mills lower profitability:

In the U.S. retail segment, the company's largest business, earnings fell 4 percent due to higher raw material costs, lower sales volume and higher advertising expenses.

Lower sales volume and higher ad expenses not withstanding, raw materials, i.e. the food ingredients they use, was still a big factor.

The article goes on to say,

General Mills has said commodity costs have increased in the 10 percent to 11 percent range in fiscal 2012 due to higher prices for ingredients like grain.

Teams of people and computers are dedicated to figuring out what's happening next with food ingredients prices, and given current trends, these costs could well continue to rise. Whether or not they will is really anyone's guess.

Labels: commodities prices, general mills, wholesale food ingredients, wholesale sugar

Truvia®, which has surged since its introduction just a few years ago to become the #2 sugar substitute in the U.S., now has a variety suited to baking.

What's the difference between regular Truvia® and Truvia® Baking Blend?

Truvia® Baking Blend is a blend of Truvia® and sugar, thus it provides the lovely browning of baked goods and ensures the chemical reactions during baking that require real sugar to happen can still happen.

This, too, is one of the reasons why there are baking blends of other common sweeteners like Splenda®. Despite the technological advances in natural and artificial sweeteners alike, there are still things that require the old fashioned ways to work. In this case, it's sugar.

One of the interesting tidbits from the press release is this,

A 1/2 cup of Truvia® Baking Blend has 190 calories and provides the same sweetness as 1 cup of sugar with 760 calories, and offers an easy conversion from full sugar recipes.

Curiously, the press release about the Truvia® baking blend only makes mention of use and pricing for the home, but as with most anything, if it's available at home, it's also available to commercial food manufacturers, too.

Labels: stevia, sugar alternatives, sweeteners, truvia

Interesting news today on the food tastiness front. Turns out, just seeing good pictures of the food we're about to eat can go a long way towards positively affecting what we think of the food.

Or, so says a multi-organizational study on the visual/taste connection that includes:

• Perception Physiology, Nestlé Research Center, Vers-chez-les-Blanc (Lausanne, Switzerland)
• Departments for Clinical Neurosciences and Radiology, Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Vaudois and University of Lausanne (Lausanne, Switzerland)
• Organization for Interdisciplinary Research Projects, The University of Tokyo (Tokyo, Japan)

Food photographers and stylists across the word are rejoicing at this news, no doubt.

This is a bit of a lengthy quote from the paper's abstract, but it really does sum things up quite nicely:

Vision provides a primary sensory input for food perception. It raises expectations on taste and nutritional value and drives acceptance or rejection....

"Using electrical neuroimaging, we assessed whether high- and low-calorie food cues... influence the brain processing and perception of taste.

"When viewing high-calorie food images, participants reported the subsequent taste to be more pleasant than when low-calorie food images preceded the identical taste....

"Our findings reveal previously unknown mechanisms of cross-modal, visual-gustatory, sensory interactions underlying food evaluation.

It's a little bit science geek-speak, but the bottom line is pretty clear: seeing good pictures of the food you're about to eat can change your opinion of it.

What's most interesting about this study is that brain activity of the participants' was actually measured, and the study didn't rely on the participants' opinions, which always makes things reek of being pseudoscience to me.

No question, making a great product means starting with great food ingredients, and now, if you're a food producer, you'd be well served to keep making the great food, and to also read the study and consider hiring a good food photographer.

Labels: food photography, food taste