The Italian job: cross-functionality took on a whole new dimension for Barilla's Restaurant Creations. Company facilities in the U.S. and Italy collaborated to deliver a line of pasta sauces unlike any other on the market

Prepared Foods, Oct, 2004 by William A. Roberts, Jr.

Sugo alla Napoletana includes a mixture of tomatoes, onions, olive oil, red wine, garlic and herbs. The Campania region is well known for its tomatoes and other vegetables that grow in its fertile volcanic soil, and which often find their way into the restaurants of Naples.

After two years of development, Barilla believes Restaurant Creations fulfills the company mission: bringing authentic Italian food items to the U.S. and, while the result echoes that mission, it also follows closely along with another important component of Barilla's team, the consumer research division. Research in the U.S. found that Barilla's sauce consumers frequently referred to their travels to Italy and great food experiences in restaurants, often regarding Italy as the "gold standard for food and lifestyle," says Wozniak. Those opinions, and the desire to bring such a restaurant experience into the home, prompted Barilla to set its developers in motion to create the Restaurant Creations line.

That process would grow to entail an entire cross-functional team effort, all with the same goal in mind: the company's mission to deliver authentic Italian food items with a degree of convenience. Barilla concedes, however, that the convenience factor is not a driving force for the product. In fact, it is an element that is downplayed, as the company recognizes that, right or wrong, consumers typically relate convenience with a lower-quality product. As such, Barilla is focusing on the end product, the result of hour upon hour of development, at facilities thousands of miles apart. The company strives to deliver authentic Italian cuisine because, as Wozniak relates, "At the end of the day, if consumers can emulate Italian chefs at home, that is a great benefit."

Honorable Mention--Retail

Masterfoods USA: Snickers Marathon Energy Bars

Recognizing an opportunity is essential to new product development, Masterfoods USA (Hackettstown, N.J.) certainly seized upon one with the launch of Snickers Marathon energy bars. Noting the double-digit annual growth of the energy bar category and a market size of greater than $1 billion, Masterfoods realized the category had a household penetration of only 15%.

The company's developers set about creating an energy bar offering competitive nutritional credentials while--at the same time--delivering a breakthrough taste that could attract those 85% of households not currently purchasing energy bars. Masterfoods' consumer research confirmed taste was the number-one barrier for non-users and that even current users were seeking the best-tasting offerings. R&D personnel then utilized formulation techniques and proprietary processing capabilities to deliver a range of energy bar choices, many of which are still on the horizon. The next few years, Masterfoods promises, will see the Marathon line grow to include high-protein, low-carb and other sub-lines.

Honorable Mention--Retail

HP Hood: Carb Countdown Dairy Beverage

In developing the Carb Countdown dairy beverage line, HP Hood's (Chelsea, Mass.) team benefited from the company's proprietary low-carbohydrate and ultra-filtration dairy technologies, but the product development actually entailed far more. The company's first national product line, Carb Countdown, required an increase in production and distribution capabilities, yet the most difficult task may have been acquiring the Atkins label on its carton to appeal to the carb-conscious masses.