Intersnack Group bought KP Snacks in December 2012 for an undisclosed sum and merged the two businesses in the UK earlier this year.
Andy Riddle, branded sales director of KP Snacks, said the company had strong growth plans that were made possible with the strength of the Intersnack merge.
“KP Snacks is committed to driving long-term, sustainable category growth in partnership with customers. It expects to achieve this by fully leveraging the snacks powerhouse that was created when the company joined forces with Intersnack Group,” he told BakeryandSnacks.com.
The company recently consolidated all its products into one portfolio – branded and white label – which would also help accessibility for customers, he said.
KP Snacks had lots of NPD planned for the rest of the year, he said, but was also far into 2015 planning. KP Snacks' recently-launched healthy snack brand Velvet Crunch would be driven further in 2014 and the company had also invested in new product development for Christmas.
Christmas a ‘key sales period’
KP Snacks said Christmas was a “key sales period” within the overall crisp and snack category.
The snack firm had developed a handful of new products for Christmas 2014 in the UK - KP coated nuts, cheese and tomato Christmas crackers and snackers tubs across its Phileas Fogg and Penn State brands.
It would also reintroduce big bag variants of KP nuts, KP frosted nuts and the cheese footballs sharing range.
Riddle said there was a huge opportunity for retailers to drive overall sales this Christmas, as consumer confidence and spending was up.
“This year we’re unveiling our strongest every Christmas range that really meets both retailers’ and consumers’ needs across all segments and flavor variants,” he said.
Citing Nielsen data, KP Snacks said sharing snacks was the biggest opportunity for major retailers – worth £218.3m in the 16-week build-up to Christmas.
Healthier snacking for the future
In addition, long-term opportunities could be found in healthier snacking, Riddle said.
“A key area of focus for KP Snacks this year and moving forward will be healthier snacking. The recent launch of its flagship healthier snacking brand Velvent Crunch represents a massive incremental sales opportunity for retailers now and in the future,” he said.
There were also a number of products containing 100 calories or less per pack, including Pom-Bear, Skips and Space Raiders, he said.