Soup Sales Hot
By John J. Pierce

Asian-style noodle is a new entry in Safeway’s revamped Signature Café refrigerated soup line.

Refrigerated soups remain most innovative segment, but new things are happening in canned soups and dry soup mixes too.

First there were Signature fresh soups at Safeway, Pleasanton, CA. Then the Signature brand was extended to sandwiches, prepared foods and pizza. And now soup line that started it all has been repackaged and revamped as Signature Café.

From a trademark application filed this summer, it appears that the Signature Café brand will be extended to other prepared foods. But there’s more to the new brand than a new logo: there has already been at least one addition to the soup line: Asian-style Chicken Noodle Soup.

Adding shiitake mushrooms, water chestnuts and bamboo shoots to the standard recipe of chicken and egg noodles, the new soup was being featured in TV commercials last month, and has attracted attention from foodies on the Internet–the kind of foodies willing to pay $4.99 for a 25 oz container.

Signature Café is gradually replacing the old Signature brand on the rest of the refrigerated soup line, which includes Chunky Chicken Noodle, Baked Potato with Bacon, Tuscan Tomato & Basil Bisque, Cravin’ Crab and Sweet Corn Chowder, Fiesta Chicken Tortilla, Rosemary Chicken & White Beans and more.

Safeway practically created the refrigerated soup category, which is dominated by store brands, but it hasn’t forgotten traditional canned soups. Only, there too it has two new lines: Eating Right (Chicken Noodle, Chicken with Wild & Red Rice, Minestrone, Chicken Gumbo, Beef Barley and Vegetable) and O Organics (Hearty Vegetable, Black Bean, Tomato Basil and Lentil), with more doubtless to come. They retail at $2.69 an 18.6 oz can and $2.59 a 15 oz can, respectively.

Fresh soup sales in private label for the 52 weeks ended 9/9/2007 were up 3.2% to $92.2 million, according to Information Resources, Inc. (IRI), Chicago, IL, with store brands accounting for 87% of the dollar volume. But the increase was outpaced this time by the gains for broth, up 14.9% to $82.7 million; and ready to heat canned soup, up 5.3% to $80.3 million. Condensed soup sales were far larger, at $172.6 million, but showed only a 1.1% increase.

Canned Soup Makeovers

Condensed soups are the oldest segment of canned soup, with store brands having played poor relations to Campbell’s for generations. But in a time of growing health concerns, Wal-Mart, Bentonville, AR, is making a big deal about its Great Value Cream of Celery and Cream of Chicken soups being 98% fat free. In ready-to-heat canned soups, meanwhile, retailers seem to be constantly repositioning their store brands.

“Chunky” is going out of style for soups positioned against Campbell’s Chunky line, for example; “Hearty” is in at retailers like Giant Eagle, Pittsburgh, PA, although the line includes familiar items like Sirloin Burger.

At Kroger, Cincinnati, OH, the kind of soups that are usually called Homestyle elsewhere are billed as Authentic Recipe, but embrace the usual suspects like Chicken Noodle, New England Clam Chowder, Minestrone and Lentil.

Trader Joe’s, Monrovia, CA, may be the first to offer private label soups that are vegan as well as organic, split pea being an example. Besides other organic soups like vegetable and lentil in 14 oz cans, the specialty-natural foods chain offers 28 oz curvy cans of creamy corn chowder, rich onion soup and lentil soup with vegetables at $2.99. Organic soups (lentil, minestrone and tomato bisque) also come in microwave cups at $2.29. And for Chinese food fans, there’s even Trader Ming’s Hot & Sour soup in 16 oz jars at $2.29.

Canned and bottled gravies are making a comeback in private label: sales were up 15.1% in the last year, to $28.1 million, according to IRI. Overall sales gained barely one percent, but whereas Heinz used to be the leading national brand, Boston Market now often gets the most facings.

It could be that the new brand on the block has focused attention on the category, and inadvertently boosted store brand sales. For sure, private label dry gravy mix sales were up only 1.3% to $31.7 million. But that’s a better record than for dry soups–off 6.1% to $21.7 million, despite innovative products like Roasted Red Pepper Asparagus and Cheddar Broccoli under the Archer Farms brand at Target, Minneapolis, MN.

As for the jump in broth sales, this can probably be attributed to the aseptic packs becoming common at chains like Wegmans, Rochester, NY.

Refrigerated Soups Redux

Big Y, Springfield, MA, which tested the waters a few years ago with a couple of fresh soups under the Nevada Annie’s brand, has now gone for a broader refrigerated soup line under the Big Y brand–but in two sizes: 10 oz for $3 and 24 oz for $6. Varieties include New England Clam Chowder, Grilled Chicken & Corn Chowder, Tomato & Garden Vegetable, and Beef Barley & Vegetable.

Kroger offers fresh soups under the Private Selection brand; and other entries in that segment include Wegmans, Harris Teeter, Matthews, NC, under the Fresh Foods Market brand; and Delhaize America, Salisbury, NC, under the Table Top brand at its upscale Bloom outlets. She Crab soup, a regional specialty that originated in Charleston, SC , can be found in both the Harris Teeter and Delhaize lines.

Raley’s, Sacramento, CA, markets fresh soup under the Nob Hill Trading Co. brand. Sacratomato Tomato Bisque, one of 12 Nob Hill flavors, is named in honor of the state capital and Raley’s hometown. “Sacratomato,” a moniker used by locals, refers to the city’s location in the Central Valley, where truckloads of fresh tomatoes pass between farms and buyers. The soup itself is made with fresh California tomatoes, real cream and a hint of Tabasco sauce.

Recommended suppliers

• Hormel Foods, Austin, MN, 507-437-5603
• Request Foods Inc., Holland, MI, 616-786-0900

Products described or shown in this article are not necessarily available from these suppliers. For more suppliers see current Private Label Directory & Buyer’s Guide.