Oreo Maker Mondelez Wants To Spend Its Coffee Money On Healthy Snacks

Multinational food giant Mondelez International Inc MDLZ is looking to buy brands that produce snacks thought to be healthy, the Financial Times reported Sunday.

What Happened: The maker of sugary snacks such as Oreo Cookies and Cadbury chocolates is redoubling its efforts to venture into healthy snacks by reducing its stake worth billions of dollars in coffee companies JDE Peet’s and Keurig Dr Pepper, FT reported.

“Launching new brands is not easy and acquiring brands that already have the prestige and the client base, and are starting to develop, is easier,” said Dirk Van de Put, CEO of Mondelez.

Van de Put also decried so-called sugar taxes as “restrictive” to customers, saying, it would limit the potential for his company to invest.

The Mondelez CEO acknowledged that the company’s products were “indulgent,” and if consumers ate too many of them — they could face obesity. 

On the move towards healthier foods, he said, “We feel it’s the right thing to do . . . to help the consumer make conscious decisions about what they eat and educate them.”

Why It Matters: Last year, Mondelez purchased Perfect Snacks, a U.S.-based protein bars manufacturer, for $284 million, FT noted.

This year, the company purchased Give & Go, a Canadian purveyor of foods for in-store bakeries and maker of gingerbread decorating kits.

The company’s chief financial officer Luca Zaramella said that Mondelez had “$10 billion worth of coffee stakes” on its balance sheets and it would like to convert “those coffee stakes into more snacking platforms and acquisitions.”

While the acquisitions are likely to be wellbeing-themed, they might go beyond the segment and are likely to be “bolt-ons,” Zaramella told FT.

Another company that has prospered in the pandemic, Campbell Soup Company CPB, said last week its outlook has “never been brighter.”

Price Action: Mondelez shares closed 1.21% lower at $56.52 on Friday.