Good afternoon, everyone. It's my great pleasure to welcome Carlos Abrams-Rivera, who's the CEO of Kraft Heinz since December of last year. My name's Alexia Howard. I've been covering the U.S. packaged food group since, I think, August of 2006. For those of you in the audience this afternoon, if you have questions for Carlos, please feel free to use the Pigeonhole link. Hopefully, it will come up on my little iPad here, and we'll work those questions into the conversation as well. So Kraft Heinz has undergone a remarkable transformation since 2019 in terms of the company's culture, the portfolio, rebuilding capabilities, including marketing, innovation, and promotional optimization, and it's receiving accolades for the progress that the company's made.
Now, clearly, at the same time, the packaged food company, more broadly, has had a very tough time in 2023, and investors are kind of now waiting with bated breath to see if volumes will improve as we lap some of the headwinds from last year. So maybe to kick things off here, Carlos, you've been back at Kraft Heinz since early 2020, and congratulations on stepping into the CEO role of at the start of the year. Yet you were also with Kraft way back before the separation of Mondelēz in 2012. So as you come, as you've come back to the company over the last few years, what has changed in your view in the gap?
Yeah, first of all, thank you for having me here.
Sure.
I appreciate the opportunity, and it's been a great day of connecting with a number of people throughout the day. You know, what I would say is I started with Kraft Heinz now four years ago. It's a completely different company than it was the moment I walked in, and I think that it's been certainly the privilege of my life to be a CEO, and a very humbling and appreciative opportunity. And I would say, you know, today, I think what I'm excited about the fact is that we're such a stronger company than we were four years ago. If you think of even just as basic as our balance sheet, right? We were, you know, junk-rated, you know, just a few years ago. We did that quickly.
Within two years, we went back to investment-grade status. We're in a place now that we can control our destiny. We removed a number of things in our portfolio that didn't fit because they were highly commoditized and exposed to private label that we were able to sell at a good valuation because we had the discipline of how we approve it, how we went through it. So again, a very much different company than we were before. And I would say, you know, while you're right, that I started my career in Kraft Foods, it is a whole different company than we were.
You know, when we went through a separation, I went with Mondelēz during that time, and I would say one of the things that was interesting to me at the time was that the exposure that Mondelēz had to international markets, which was much stronger than what Kraft had. And when I come into this company, still today, about 25% of our business is outside of the U.S., and emerging market is only 10% of our company. And I feel blessed that we have a brand like Heinz, that is such an iconic brand that has the opportunity for us to continue to drive growth in those emerging markets.
So I think for me, that is something of the path that I have learned, and I think we're taking as we go forward as part of our ten-year strategy, is how we diversify ourselves in more international markets, in more emerging markets. I think the other thing that probably has been a learning, too, through that process was that, you know, the importance of culture to drive the transformation of a company. If I think about our company, you know, one of the things we're very proud of is that we had a sense in Kraft Heinz of ownership and ambition, and for me was, how do I take those things and evolve it in a way that can be true for a better company of today? So... I'll give you two examples.
If I think about ownership, there was a sense of the culture that it was, the ownership was about me, I own it. We changed that over the last four years to say, we own it together. That has an implication of our incentive for our people. That's an implication in terms of how we think about what- how do we grow the company for the long term, not just for the now? A company that is not about just what's the next acquisition, but how do we actually grow organic growth, focusing on our consumers. So that is a big shift. Still ownership, but a much more focus on the we and the future. The other piece that I think it was part of something that attracted me from the first place is, a company with a lot of very ambitious people who wanted to win.
And I think the difference may have been in terms of our culture, was that there was a sense of almost a arrogance, organizational to our culture, that we wanted to do everything ourselves. We knew better. In fact, it would go as far as to say, when the company was created from the merger, they explicitly said that we didn't want people who had food experience to come to our company. To me, the idea was, it's important that we wanna grow organically, to have people who can fit with the capabilities we need to grow a food company, which has very unique kind of sense of what it takes to grow a company like ours.
It's still ambitious, but now more humble, to be thoughtful about how do we actually learn from others, and how do we partner better with other peoples in order for us to drive growth?
Makes sense. I'm sure we'll get on to the incentive question later to see how that's changed. Okay, so one of the things that struck me most about the company over the past few years is how much external recognition the company's received for many of the capabilities that I just mentioned, that were very much neglected during the 3G era.
Mm.
particularly things like marketing. Now, how did you pull that off, or how did you and Miguel pull this off over the last few years?
Listen, that was a priority from day one for Miguel. I mean, I think we cannot be growing a company in a competitive environment like food if we don't invest in the marketing and understanding our consumer better. And I think, again, if you had a philosophy that, oh, the real way you were gonna grow is through inorganic acquisitions, then that, you didn't have to invest in those kind of capabilities. And you're right, we have been recognized, and I think at Cannes, we were the most awarded food company. Ad Age put us as a top kind of more creative company, and more recently, our—we just won an award, a top three more effective marketers by Effie. And for me, that idea of both thinking about creatively being recognized, but also efficiency in our marketing is important.
So we have, we have come a long way, and it has been us being thoughtful about what we're actually going to recognize as the differentiator for us in a very competitive food environment. But I'll also tell you that we're not done. If I think about the changes we have just made over the last six months, we created a Chief Growth Officer as a company in order to make sure we invest behind a brand growth system that allows us to make sure that we are looking at what is the data-driven decisions of how we best deploy our marketing dollars, so we have the right returns? And also, how do we make sure we have the right sustainability of sufficiency in terms of spending on marketing in our different businesses?
That allows us to now be looking at deployment of capital on marketing dollars across the company in a way that is not just giving more money to marketing, but also being more effective in the use of the marketing dollars. So that's a journey that we'll continue to go as we go forward.
Maybe we can pivot to innovation. You also got external recognition from Fast Company recently as one of the world's most innovative companies. Can you give us some examples of your more memorable big wins on the innovation side that you've seen since returning to the company?
Yeah. I don't get tired of you saying that, by the way. I think that, you know, the fact that today we already recognized as one of the most innovative company, I think it's, it's a, it's a huge amount of win in a very short amount of time. And it's, it's because this is something that we have prioritized. And I will say is, there's two types of innovation: There's the innovation that consumers get to see and the, the ones they don't see. So let me just break down a little more to Alexia. If I think about the things that consumers see, they'll see the renovation of our products. So whether that is cleaner ingredients, better packaging, you know, less sugar, better nutrition, and products and with the attributes that they care about.
So that is, whether that is a Jell-O Zero Sugar that we launched last year and has developed... driven a lot of growth for our dessert business, whether that is us continue to drive improving in terms of the choices that we make for consumers, a mac and cheese that go from plant-based to gluten-free products, that's the kind of renovation we're gonna continue to see, consumers will see from us. There's also the disruptive innovation. You know, when I joined, I remember the first 60 days talking, after 60 days, talking to the board of directors and saying: "You know, Kraft Heinz, we didn't have an innovation problem. We had a good innovation problem." Meaning, we were throwing a lot of stuff out there, but the things that would only be lasting for about, you know, six to nine months.
It created a huge amount of inefficiency in our factories, a huge amount of waste. We have improved that to focus on innovation that is truly new to the world, that is disruptive. So you'll see more IP-driven innovations for us, whether that is in away-from-home, in things like Heinz Remix machine, that hopefully you have seen, that now we have deployed with restaurants, whether that is in technology like 360CRISP that we use first in a grilled cheese sandwich that you can put in the microwave, frozen, and it comes out like you actually did it yourself on the stovetop.
We're taking that same technology across our Taco Bell business now to make sure that when you make quesadillas that you put in the oven, sorry, you put in the microwave, and it tastes just like it were in the oven. It's the same technology that we're bringing across a scale of our products. That's part of what consumers will see, that disruptive innovation and the renovation. What the consumer may not see is the innovation we're driving on how we actually produce some of our products. The amount of investment in technology to drive better efficiency in our factories, better efficiency in our logistics. You know, we talked about Agile@Scale as a program that allows us to be more thoughtful of how we deploy our logistics in technology and logistics in order to be more efficient.
And again, that's innovative thinking that consumers don't get to see, but is a huge benefit for us as a company as well.
Let's turn to the emerging markets.
Okay.
Now, the Heinz brand... I was, I was actually fascinated to find this slide, from a few years ago, where we were told that the Heinz brand was about $4 billion in global sales all the way back in 2021, and it's really the backbone of the company's emerging market growth plans. Where are the biggest opportunities in emerging markets, and can you share some success stories from the go-to-market initiative?
Great. Yeah, for us, if you think about North America versus international, outside of North America, we really are a sauces Taste Elevation company. And for that, Heinz, it's such an iconic brand that even in countries where we're not present, there is a latent demand for our products. I think part of it has to do, too, with the fact that whether it's, you know, Hollywood movies and TV shows, they always put a Heinz bottle in the restaurant in order to bring quality to the restaurant and credibility. So for us, in emerging markets, what we have is the benefit of having an iconic brand that allows us to continue to drive growth and a go-to-market model that you alluded to.
For those of you who haven't heard about the go-to-market model, it's the idea of us first partnering with the right distributor in order for us to start building the scale of the business. Then we deploy our people, and then we actually bring our manufacturing in order for us to improve the gross margin. That sequence and discipline of how we're actually gonna penetrate those businesses has been a successful way in which we're gonna be able to grow emerging markets. The other thing I would say, Alexia, is that, you know, part of my learning over the years has been this idea of us planting flags in different emerging markets for the sake of it does not work.
So we have been disciplined to say there are four key emerging markets in which we're gonna grow: Brazil, Mexico, Indonesia, and China, and we're gonna stay focused on those things. I think acquisitions could be a way to accelerate a path to emerging markets, but that is kind of the underpinning of our emerging market strategy, is thinking about those key markets and make sure we deploy our go-to-market models in the right way. And I'll give you the last example, which is, if I think a business like a country like, like Chile. So Chile today is a business that already we deployed the right distributors, and we put in already the right people from our teams to be in the country. At the same time, we still are shipping product from the US to Chile.
So the next stage in our development market is, how do we think about creating the manufacturing strategy within the Southern Cone for us to support that business and continue to expand margins? So we'll be doing that in a disciplined way, and we have a couple of those markets that are upcoming, too. But until now, our key focus have been the big four.
Makes sense. Okay. Can you talk about the away-from-home strategy? Because, the food service channels, I think, represent about 15%-
Right.
of company-wide sales.
Yes. Yep. Listen, I mean, for us, if I... Let me, I guess, give you the context for, for you and the people in the room, is that there are three key pillar for growth from us. There is the emerging markets that I mentioned, it's about 10%. We want that to triple over the next 10 years. We have our North America Accelerate Platform driving our growth, and at the same time, our away-from-home business that, as you pointed out, 15% of our business, that also gonna contribute a third of our growth as we go forward. The benefit that we have as a company is that about half of our away-from-home business actually sits in the front of the store or the restaurants. So we are less of a, maybe different than other company.
We're not necessarily all in the kitchen, we're actually in the front end area, where it becomes also a way in which we can develop marketing more like a Coke's than any other food companies that you may be able to see out there. So it is an opportunity for us to drive pull with consumers and continue to grow our brand through generating kind of the marketing dollar away, because of the away-from-home business. It also is more and more becoming a source of innovation for the company. So I mentioned the HEINZ REMIX machine. When you create 200... You have the ability to create 200 sauces combination, we get that data to understand what are consumers choosing to do, and then that allows us to actually use that combination to then launch into retail environment as well, too.
And we're using that, too, in not only in the away-from-home business within a company like a restaurant, but we're also doing it more and more in things like travel and leisure environments. So when you go... You know, one of the things we're doing in, we're partnering with, in a company program we call Heinz Selection, that we began in Central America and in Mexico. And the idea is, we work with hotel chains to create custom solutions for them that allows us to see what are the things that consumers care about, what are the product combinations that they like? Do they have a particular sauce? The chef wanna create something unique for that particular restaurant in the hotel environment, then they can be inspiration for us to take in the retail environment.
So again, it's a marketing tool, it's an opportunity for us to grow in a different way, and it's also a source of inspiration for our innovation as well, too.
I'm not sure you're gonna be able to answer this directly, but we've had a question come in on the Pigeonhole: If emerging market M&A is possible, would you go after Unilever's assets again? I presume the answer is that you can't answer that directly, but in that sort of general area.
Yeah, without speaking about any one particular company, what I would say is, if you look at the last four acquisitions we have made in the last four years, three of them have been in Taste Elevation in emerging markets. So, our clarity of that we presented at CAGNY of us continue to grow through Taste Elevation will remain that as we go forward. You know, I've had the benefit of working with Miguel for the last four years, so the strategy that we laid out is a strategy that I believe, and there will be continuity in that strategy. At the same time, we have a bias towards emerging market, because we know that it can be a way for us to accelerate a path towards our goals.
Whether, you know, any assets that are fit those categories will be assets that we'll be looking at.
Makes sense. Okay. Now, we already talked a little bit about the Heinz brand. It's obviously a juggernaut brand in the world of taste and flavor. How are you tapping into this global growth, and where do you see the longer term opportunities?
Yeah, great question, Alexia. You know, again, I mentioned for us, we still are. I guess, let me give you some facts. Today, Heinz Global is about 19% penetration. When I compare that to other iconic brands, it's more in the 30%. So we have a huge amount of opportunity still for us to continue to grow our Heinz business. And again, I mentioned earlier, there's a latent demand for our brand. So we see opportunity for us to continue to drive that growth as we go forward. And it's for us to. One advantage that we have with our focus on growth and flavors and enhancers is that we don't have to go in to teach consumers how to use our product. We actually can get the benefit that we elevate the product they have.
So I'll give you an example. If you go to Brazil, you're actually gonna put ketchup, Heinz ketchup, in the pizza. Now, we're not gonna try to teach Italians how to put, you know, Heinz ketchup in their pizza, if I wanna go back to Italy at some point. But I will say, how do we make sure that we adapt to the local flavor, how consumers are using it? If you look at some of our QSR restaurant partners, if you look out to China, most of the sales on our, on our QSR partners are actually in chicken, not in burgers. So how do we think about sauces that better suit, fit the consumer in that particular market based on the flavor profile?
If you go to Egypt, they put the, actually, you know, Heinz Ketchup in other, in other combination of more cooking type of environment. So we have the advantage, again, that no matter what the local cuisine is, we can actually enhance it and make it better through our products, versus having to teach people how to use it.
Got it. Okay, can we talk about the ways you've, the way that you work with retailers?
It's your conference. We can talk anything you want.
Perfect.
Just tell me.
I like that. Excellent. All right, so let's talk about how the ways that you've worked with retailers have changed over the last few years, given the advancement of digital capabilities and the more data sharing that you now do with them-
Right
... back and forth.
Listen, that has been one of the maybe not as much publicized, but has been one of the biggest change we have seen in the company. I think part of that has been there was a sense that in our relationship with our retailers, it was a I win, you lose type of relationship. So we had to rebuild some trust and partnership with the retailers, that now we're in a place much stronger than we've ever been. And I think part of that, what it has led to is that, you know, for example, today, you mentioned about digital tools. Today, we actually ingest data directly from our retailers in order for us to better service their own stores, and that started with one customer in which we built enough trust that they don't...
We could get the raw data directly into our systems. We could then see, not only deploy our products directly, not just to their warehouse, but the actual stores that they may need the product. We can also better understand, based on how consumer patterns are doing, when in the month they need different type of products that we can better service it to. And then we have been able to then take that same program into other key major retailers across the United States. So that kind of partnership continues, but it also is using digital tools to better help them understand how to set up the shelf.
So we have now programs in which we basically take photos of shelf, and we can go to them to say, "Listen, based on how consumers are shopping the shelf, let me give you a better assortment of how the shopper is gonna... how better to set up the shelf." And we're also using virtual reality to better understand what will be the impact of how we bring new innovation into the category, how that's gonna be positioned into the experience of the consumer.
So I'll give you an example that in Dollar General, for example, we have grown the business in distribution this year about 10% from last year, and it came as a result of us working with Dollar General to show them, in a virtual environment, what the shelf in stores will look like as consumers now not only go to that channel for merchandising, but also for food. So that allows us to then work with buyers through, you know, the virtual glasses to say, "Here's kind of how the environment consumers are gonna shop. Here's how you should set up the stores in order to do better." That then allows us to kind of increase distribution in that particular channel.
Certainly, it's very different from where we were-
Yes
... 10, 15, 20 years ago, for sure. Okay, let's-
But also think about the fact that it's so much more efficient, too.
Right.
It used to be, you know, a lot of Excel files, a lot of planograms, a lot of people, which we now can deploy into more value-added types of professional services and work, versus just simply having to kind of produce all the different materials that they were doing in the past.
Makes sense. Okay, maybe just digging into the promotional strategy a little bit more. It seems as though the promotional strategy has been very disciplined, with promotional levels lower than in 2019, but with higher returns on investment. I think Miguel talked a lot about that last year. How has this come about, and what can you do today that you couldn't do before the pandemic?
A lot. I think that, you know, it started with us thinking that... I think there was a philosophy in the company back to 2019 of, "Let's just cut costs, and let's just cut SG&A and reduce our way to success," which I don't think works. So we actually have made investments in SG&A in order to have better solutions, and revenue management has been one of the benefits of that. So we... You know, before the world was talking about AI, over the last three years, we've actually been investing in creating our own AI models, and we created partnership with people like Microsoft to develop solutions internally to better understand how to elevate the quality of the promotions.
So when we talk about that, you know, we have discipline on the ROI and the returns of the program, it's because of the modeling that we have been doing over the last three years that allows us to be more science-based in terms of how we deploy our dollars to support our brands. And it used to be, we have all these programs that were negative ROI that we have been able to clean. Not only that, but then we can get data right away on what works, what doesn't, and better predict the programs that we'll need at different points of the year. We then share those things with the customers to better understand how to create those promotions throughout the calendar based on, again, the data science that our models are ingesting in order to, again, get better returns on those.
Makes sense. It's, it's come a long way from using a single spreadsheet to try to optimize-
That's correct
... a single view.
I think that will continue to evolve, too. I think we are doing very well compared to CPG, but I think there's still a lot of opportunity for us to be even getting it better to go forward. 'Cause sometimes, you know, many times you're still dealing with humans in the middle of all this. So they may have, it's like, "Yeah, I hear what the data says, but I believe that I've done this." It's like, so there's still a little bit of change management that we have to do with our partners to make sure they believe everything that we're predicting is gonna happen.
Great. Can we turn to the kind of the elephant in the room in the industry and the short-term industry dynamics?
Okay.
Volume and price trends seem to be very top of mind for investors today. Volumes have been weaker than expected over the last year, and now restaurant traffic also seems to be in decline. What do you think has happened in terms of consumer behavior and how this has affected how you run the business? Where do we go from here?
Well, that's a big question.
Yep.
What I would say is, you know, consumers are still gonna be looking for value. And I think what's happening is that there is a high-end consumer that, even though they're doing well, they're still gonna be shopping more and looking for more places in which they can certify the value mentality. In fact, half of consumers believe that we're in a recession. So that makes a difference in terms of how do you think about what are you gonna spend money on, and what are you gonna -- how are you going to feed the family? I think for the way I see it, is that they are... Particularly in the U.S., we are making sure that we strengthen the value that we provide consumers, and pricing is only part of it.
You know, the more we invest in the quality of our product, the more we provide the attributes that consumers care about, the better we'll do, because that is part of the total value equation we can bring to a consumer. If we have a mac and cheese that is gluten-free, and I have a family that needs to have gluten-free, that is something that is worth paying for. If I wanna make sure that I have a product that, you know, that I, I'm gonna go to Costco because I believe that, or a club store, because I believe that it's important for me to kind of have the better value, and I can afford to have five, six packs of mac and cheese, I need to, as a company, make sure we're present there, too.
I do think that the part you made—that's on the retail environment—is to make sure that as a company, we are agnostic to where consumers shop, that we provide value by making sure we invest in the quality, the attributes that consumers care about, and we're in the channels that they continue to push. You know, I mentioned that, we were expanding our presence in Dollar General, we're expanding our presence in club stores in order to be agnostic of where our consumers shop. In the away-from-home environment, it's a little bit different, I think, in the U.S. versus outside of the U.S. You know, in the Q1 , I think we saw probably a little softer industry than I expected.
I think in the restaurant environment, you're gonna see, the restaurant chains beginning to be more focused on value, too, and create different type of promotions for consumers, that I think we'll get the benefit of that as we go into the second half of the year. Already there, there's a number of our partners that are talking about that, in order for them, again, to improve the traffic in their stores. At the same time, even in food service in the U.S., we are seeing things like travel, entertainment, that continue to be strong. And for us, the benefit that we have had over the last year of us expanding the channels in which we are present has helped us, too.
So, I think that the volume on away from home, you'll start seeing that pick up as we go into the second half of the year, even as we are seeing that, you know, Q1 that was probably softer than we all seen. Now, for us as a company, the way we can shape our volume for our long-term algorithm is dependently, depending on away from home, but it's also depending on emerging markets. We've also been seeing emerging markets grow volume since 2023, so that continues. And the way the algorithm is shaped is that we only need about 0.5% of our algorithm to come from volume in the US. So really, it's not like we need 2%-3% volume in order for us to deliver the growth of our business.
Already, we're seeing in the last four to seven weeks, volume improving in our business in the U.S. And in fact, our volume share in our Sauces platform is now growing. And if you look at our company, there probably are two things that are bringing our volume below last year. One, is the fact that we actually have a discontinued product that was a Heinz Vinegar, and it's a bulk product that people were using more for cleaning than for food. And we had a philosophy that we wanna make sure that our products are about, how do we create the mastery of the Heinz brand and bring kind of food solutions to the table, and that product didn't fit, and it had negative EBITDA margin.
So it was there. Even though it was, it was generating quite a bit of volume, about $60 million a year, we actually felt that it was the right thing for us to discontinue that product. And then in the U.S., in particular, we have the Capri Sun business that because it's liquid, it's actually particularly heavy, and we have to renovate that product. So as we speak right now, Alexia, you'll see us come up with a new product in Capri Sun right now, that will be ready for beginning in the summer. And we're spending three times on the marketing Capri Sun than we were a year ago. So you're gonna see us continue to drive the things that we believe are the right things for our volumes.
At the same time, recognizing that there is a headwind there because of the vinegar business that we exited, but it was the right thing for us to do.
... when will we lap the Heinz Vinegar exit?
In going to Q1 of next year.
Okay.
Yeah.
Perfect. Moving on, is it fair to say that Kraft Heinz has effectively dismantled its functional silos, as many long-term managers and leaders left the company a decade ago when 3G arrived? It seems as though the employee base has shifted. Well, at that time, the employee base shifted to younger and less experienced, but still analytical people with strong educational backgrounds. But at that time, the lack of experience was an issue, and so when Miguel came in, he did seem to hire a lot of CPG veterans, including yourself-
Right
... from a number of different companies who could bring best practices with them. I mean, it just comes back to your point about the cultural shift. Do you think? I mean, I just remember from my days in consulting, the functional silos were a real problem, and back then, it didn't really matter that much because the industry was very safe and stable, so having people that were preserving the status quo was fine.
Yeah.
But now it's so much more disruptive. I mean, do you, do you really think that Heinz - that Kraft Heinz now has an advantaged culture because of everything it's been through?
Listen, it was a tough lesson to learn for the company, but I think one that we have learned very well. And I think it's a. Let me give you a couple of ways in which we have think differently about the company today. One is, you're right, that we brought in different capabilities into the company, with people who have experience, that are still youngish, by the way. We're not all old. Thank you, Alex. But at the same time, that they had the experience in food. But we did that, at the same time, we're also investing in the talent that we had in the company to make sure we upskill the capabilities of the people here, too.
So when I have now my leadership team, everybody in my leadership team, all the people that I promoted, they were all people who were coming internally from our company. So those are people that we've been building and investing and upskilling into our company to have the right capability to run the company forward. So it was both things. It was complemented with the right talent, but also upskilling and developing the coaching and the people that we had. But you started with the concept of silos, and for me, one of the things that I saw as a, as something that we had to change is that, yes, we were all owners, but it was because I owned it and you didn't. And not only that, but my compensation was impacted if the more resources they get to you and not to me.
We have changed that, both in terms of our long-term incentive and our short-term incentive. Today, our company is focused on driving things that are improving the top line and the margins of the company. Even in the short-term incentive, so the bonus that we have for everybody, we used to have six different KPIs that people had to achieve. They were individual KPIs. You may have six, I may have completely different six. Today, we have five, and two of them are common for all of us, whether you are a plant manager or you're sitting in operation in Chicago. The idea is that... Those two are share and gross margin. The idea is that we're driving the growth, and we're making sure we are focused on the efficiency of that growth.
Because the more we are working and again, rowing in the same direction, the more we can accelerate the virtual cycle of growth in our company. So that idea, that's, it wasn't just about saying, "We need to break down cycles." It's how did you create the incentive structure to make sure you also break down those silos that we had in the company?
That makes perfect sense, and, yes, I can see how the incentive change would really have made a difference to the way people behave internally.
100%.
Miguel introduced the concept of Agile@S cale a few years ago, which is linked to this same concept. How has that program evolved over time, and what have been the big wins along the way?
Yeah, and for those of you who may not be as familiar with it, you know, for us, the idea of Agile@Scale is both using technology to derive solutions or pain points that we have in the company. I'll give you a couple of examples. That's one part of it. The other part of it is: How do we work in an agile methodology in order for us to also drive growth aggressively against the biggest priorities? In terms of using technology, when we talk about things like revenue management, it was investing in the digital tools in order for us to actually be able to create the AIs that allows us to have the revenue management solutions we need.
It was about bringing partners along with us that allows us, for example, to improve how we think about our logistics, to reduce the amount of challenges we had in service, and better service our customers. So we create unique solutions, in this case, with Microsoft, that allows us to better serve with our customers and better understand how we set up our manufacturing to be able to be more ahead of the need of changing equipment, because we were going to better plug how the machinery in our factories are actually being run, so that we can detect easier before a machine breaks down, that we actually are going to be able to need to do preventive maintenance ahead of it. So it's both on operation logistics, using partners to embed that.
When we talk about Agile with technology, we've also brought in about 150 people who have data scientists, who understand how to work on an Agile methodology. Also, we have dedicated team from our other functions to that particular part in order for them to kinda drive this idea forward. There's another part of Agile@Scale, which is: How do we bring the design thinking into the things we do? So, an area like innovation, we are going to have the Agile methodology of saying we're gonna go with the same way a software company does, where you have a version 1 and a version 2.0, and a version 3.0.
We're applying that to our innovation as well, too, so that we can say, you know, we're gonna launch with a product, but we're not gonna also stop there. We're gonna continue to improve the product as we get more information from consumers, and make sure that we are bringing relevant solutions to the consumer based on the learnings that we have. So it's an ongoing way of us managing the biggest opportunity we have in terms of innovation.
I think you revealed sometime fairly recently that the number of projects under Agile@S cale has stepped up over time, and obviously, so you've got more-
Yes
... resource dedicated toward it. How do you decide what goes on the agenda? You know, what-
It's a great question.
Steps on one side.
That's a great question. Because it's very easy. You know, at the beginning, I'll tell you a story. Like, at the beginning, nobody wanted to be in the agile team because they're like: "What is this? I'm in my function. I understand how to work in this environment." Today, what happened about after a year and a half, it was that everybody wanted to be in an agile pod. What we used is the idea of how do we what is the value creation that we develop on those things, in those idea, before we commit to an agile pod? So a business like... In revenue management, we have delivered over $400 million worth of benefits from having kind of a different agile pod working on our revenue management systems.
It's when we look at new opportunities, it's through the lens of what is the value that it's gonna create for the company before we deploy the resources? Because, again, we're dedicating resources from people who today may be doing something else into that particular pod. So we want to make sure that it's worth the effort on our end.
Makes sense. Okay, we're coming into the last 12 minutes or so here. Now, the company seems to have been more successful than other companies across the packaged food space, at partnering with outside companies to tap into best-of-breed capabilities. You already mentioned Microsoft, for example, and NotCo is another example on the plant-based side. What has the company learned from these relationships, and how will this shape your approach to future partnerships?
Yeah. I think I mentioned earlier that there was, in the company in 2019, I think there was an organizational arrogance that we did it all ourselves. And I think it starts with the fact that we, we can see how, with a clear strategy, we can look at what are the partners out there that can help us achieve the strategy faster. So we decided to do the Agile@Scale program. Microsoft was a great partner we did bring in to help us understand how we can accelerate our journey to that. You mentioned NotCo, and the joint venture we created with NotCo in a moment in which many companies and people were asking us why not we invest in a plant-based company, why we not buy somebody. Valuations were wrong. It wasn't the right thing for us.
But we created a joint venture in order not only to learn about how to get into the space, but also NotCo actually brought an AI formulation solution in order for us to learn how to apply AI to develop new formulas. So when you're seeing Oscar Mayer, you know, plant-based product, came out of the fact that we have the AI with the joint venture that allows us to create a better formula and deploy that against our biggest opportunities in our products. But we also are looking in terms of places like our, you know, Ore-Ida business. To me, Ore-Ida is a brand that came with Heinz, and for the last six to seven years, we have never seen what the opportunity truly is for Ore-Ida.
Okay.
Because we had one factory that was not very well run, and had a limited amount of capacity. To build a new French fried Ore-Ida potato business manufacturing site, would have been somewhere around $600 million-$700 million. So it would have been a huge amount of capital in order to do that. We created this partnership with Simplot, who, you know, one of the largest potato companies in the world. They supply the McDonald's french fries, for example. They have access to, you know, five different factories in the U.S. alone. That allows us to then see how do we actually unlock the opportunities to Ore-Ida. And I'll tell you, today, already, Ore-Ida is growing.
We have a better product that we have renovated, and we have a path of number of innovations that are gonna be coming to market because we have the partnership with somebody like, like, Simplot. You see in places like our Taco Bell partnership that I mentioned earlier. You know, it's a, it's a partnership that, in the past, we had left, almost treated like a second class, when in fact, if you think about Taco Bell, it's one of the most successful restaurants out there. We had a unique partnership with them. They spend $300 million a year in marketing, and if you look at our products in the restaurant, back in 2019 in the supermarket, they look completely different than anything they had in the restaurants. We now, our teams are now working together.
We now have similar kind of look and feel. Our products are jointly launched. We have the quality that is consistent with the quality of the restaurants, and it's giving a huge opportunity for us to continue to drive growth. So again, I think it came out from us being humble to understand that there's partners who can help us accelerate the growth, and then making sure that we make the right options in terms of the places that are a priority for us to continue to drive accelerated growth.
I have to ask the Oscar Mayer question.
Okay.
So we all know that-
Yes, I like bacon. Is that the Oscar Mayer question? No.
Not quite.
Okay.
So we all know that Oscar Mayer is a nostalgic brand, that's been around for over 100 years. Now, investors, I think, today, are concerned that its performance has deteriorated and perhaps it's more commoditized, and should be sold, like, much like the nuts and cheese businesses, have been in recent years. So how do you think about the long-term potential of the Oscar Mayer brand?
... Well, I guess I'd start, Alexia, with the fact that, you know, we designated different roles within our portfolio. So in CAGNY, we mentioned accelerate, protect, and balance. In our balanced portfolio, we have meat, cheese, and coffee. And they're, they're there for a reason. They're there for a reason because we believe there are- there's less growth. They, they bring a scale with our retailers because of the size and importance of their brands for the retailer environment, too. So it's not the brands that we're gonna milk. I mean, we're gonna continue to renovate. If you look at Oscar Mayer business, by the end of the year, you'll see new packaging that truly brings new benefits to consumers. We have, you know, new innovation. We have a plant-based Oscar Mayer. We just launched a stuffed hot dog, Oscar Mayer.
But we are also gonna be clear on what we expect for those businesses. You know, it brings clarity of the strategy to say to the teams who are coming into those balanced businesses, "Your role is not gonna be driving 2, 3, or 4% growth. Your business is, make sure we have the right product for us to maintain the share and the, and the environment in which we compete. But at the same time, we are and be more focused on the bottom line, so that we can have the right EVA contribution for those businesses." So I would say, there's a role to play for those businesses within our portfolio, and at the same time, portfolio is one of those things that are very dynamic.
We're gonna continue, just like we looked at, you know, our Planters business, our cheese business, we're always gonna look at opportunities. But I will say we are very disciplined in how we think about those things. If you think about the investments we have made, we have done it at the right value evaluation, and we have the strength of a balance sheet. That doesn't mean that we need to take any actions in the short term. So for us, it's let's be diligent to how we actually run those. Let's make sure that we do it consistently with the role of those businesses, and in the meantime, then they have a scale to play, a role to play in our- in the scale of the company.
Thank you. Very helpful. The packaged food industry overall seems to be going through something of a transformation in terms of digital capabilities in marketing, promotions, distribution, retailer relationships. Kraft Heinz has been making sizable investments across all of that-
Yeah
... the marketing, the technology, and the R&D. Can you talk about how your investments, particularly in digital, have allowed you to make advancements across those areas?
Yeah. You know, let me just go back to the Agile@Scale piece. You know, today we have 38 different Agile@Scale pods, mostly in North America, which is one of the things you'll see us change as we go forward, so that we can truly be a opportunity across the entire company. And part of my view of what you're gonna see change from our strategy as we go forward, is how do we deploy that Agile@Scale as a company, not just in North America? But those 34 Agile@Scale pods that we have, 19 of them have an AI solution embedded in them. So for us is, how do we deploy AI solutions that allows us to drive better efficiency in our factories, better efficiency in our logistics, and better efficiency on how we go to our retail environment?
You know, let me give you an example. If I think about, you know, one of the, one of the successes that we've had in a partnership with Microsoft has been on a Philadelphia business. And one of the things that we have been able to do is to say, when you look at a... We took a factory, and we brought our developers and engineers and their developer engineers, and we look at our, you know, how we run that particular plant. And what was happening was that, you know, sometimes the equipment starts breaking down, and we would only be able to fix it after it broke down. By us putting sensors across the entire line of Philadelphia Cream Cheese, we can see what are the things that actually will be breaking down, that we can actually address before then.
Just on one line, on one factory, it had been about $10 million in savings just on that. That's a model that now we're taking to other parts of our company in order to continue to replicate. So we have... I think I will say, like I mentioned earlier, we have done more than most, but we have still a lot of opportunity for us to continue to drive this in the future.
Makes sense. As we wrap up here, what should we, as investors, keep top of mind as we think about Kraft Heinz as an incremental investment opportunity? How is the company positioned to win?
Well, first of all, I think, let me go back to where I started beginning, which is we're a much stronger company. We have the right balance sheet now. We feel good about clarity of strategy for the next 10 years, so what we have to do. We have clarity of our portfolio roles. I think over the last three years, I think it's been difficult for investors to see how much change truly have happened at Kraft Heinz, whether it's because of COVID, because of inflation. You know, we are a different company, from our culture, to the people, and how we have evolved our culture, how we brought different capabilities to our company, and how we are bringing a focus on efficiency as we're driving the top line of the company.
We're a company that is focused on driving organic growth, not just spending on acquisitions. And I think for investors is, you know, we are a company that we've been around for 150 years, and now we have the team in place and the structure and the right priorities in order to be another 150 years also here in the company.
Perfect. Well, with that, thank you so much for your time, Carlos.
Thank you for your time, Alexia.
Really appreciate it.
I appreciate it.
Hopefully we'll do it again at some point down the road.
We will.
Thank you.
Thank you.