HERSHEY, Pa. – Last week Michele Buck, executive vice president and COO of The Hershey Company, shared progress on the company’s commitment to transition products to simple, familiar ingredients and to transparently share information about what’s in their products and their responsible sourcing programs.
Key milestones include:
- Reformulating more than 500 product SKUs to simpler ingredients
- Introducing new products with simple, familiar ingredients
- Transitioning to simpler ingredients by early 2017
- Leading the development and adoption of the industry-wide transparency platform, SmartLabel, on-pack for 800 product SKUs by the end of 2016 and all Hershey products by 2017
“People all over the world are progressively becoming more interested in the ingredients and sourcing of their foods. That’s why we made a commitment in February 2015 to transition products across our portfolio to simple ingredients and continue our work with transparency—sharing information about what’s in our products and strengthening our responsible sourcing programs,” says Buck in a blog post.
Buck noted that Hershey is working to transition additional confection products to simpler ingredients; Hershey’s Special Dark Chocolate, Mr. Goodbar Milk Chocolate Bars, Krackel Chocolate Bars and Hershey’s Miniatures Assortment, without artificial ingredients, will hit store shelves by early 2017.
As highlighted in its 2015 CSR report, Hershey will also continue to responsibly source sustainable ingredients. The future goals for responsibly sourced ingredients include achieving 100% certified and sustainable cocoa in all chocolate products worldwide by 2020, and sourcing 100% cage-free eggs for products in North America by 2020.
“When it comes to our iconic brands, we’re all about goodness. While our belief is simple, making sure that it’s reflected in everything we do takes a lot of planning,” Buck says. “This work is still just beginning, and we continue to look for new, innovative ways to meet consumers’ changing expectations and deliver the great-tasting, quality products they know and love.”