• 🪖 BranchOut Locks In Army Contract
• 📈 Mondelez: Price Hikes Coming as Cocoa Inflation Continues
• 🛒 White House Pushes Further Into Instacart Partnership

M&A activity continues to accelerate. Today we are bringing you updates on the changing snack landscape as Our Home expands its platform with tried-and-true Utz Brand muscle. Additionally we run down news that distressed salad dressing maker Tessemae’s has found a new home and share details on a growing pasta platform. 

🥨 Our Home, formerly known as Powered by Real Food From The Ground Up, announced today it has acquired R.W. Garcia and Good Health brands from Utz, along with two new manufacturing facilities and control of a lease on Utz’s Las Vegas production plant.

• The transaction is valued at approximately $182.5 million and will help Utz reduce long term debt; it is expected to close on Feb. 5, 2024.
• Both snack players are set to gain from the deal while leveraging manufacturing and distribution synergies between the two businesses: Our Home will continue to make certain Utz products and select Good Health products will continue to be sold through Utz’s DSD network.
• At close, Our Home will operate five manufacturing facilities and have the ability to vertically integrate its salty snack business which includes Food Should Taste Good, Popchips, Real Food From The Ground Up, and YOU NEED THIS. 

🥗 Tessemae’s emerged from bankruptcy this morning after PANOS Brands, the parent company of Walden Farms, Chatfield’s and Mi-Del cookies, among others, announced it acquired certain assets of its salad dressings and condiments portfolio.

• PANOS stated that the integration of the Tessemae’s business will complement its existing Walden Farms dressings line. 
• "We're excited to partner with retailers to expand availability of Tessemae's across markets to service the strong consumer interest in the refrigerated and shelf stable dressings,” said Darcy Zbinovec, CEO of PANOS brands. 

🍝 Frozen pasta maker Seviroli Foods is rolling in ravioli. The company announced it has purchased three frozen pasta brands – Bernardi, Rotanelli’s and Mona’s – from Japan’s Ajinomoto Group.

• The deal will also see Seviroli, which is owned by PE firm Mill Point Capital, take control of “related intellectual property and equipment” for the three brands. 
• In July, Seviroli also acquired frozen pasta manufacturer Mama Rosie’s. 

Bend, Ore.-based BranchOut Foods has signed on with the U.S. Army to enhance MREs (Meals Ready-to-Eat) using the snack and ingredient company’s proprietary GentleDry dehydration technology.

🤤 BranchOut has just completed a key step in the partnership – “sensory evaluation by troops” – and expects to complete shelf life testing by March. Once all stages are complete, products with the highest approvals will be added to the Army’s MRE program. 

🥦 The GentleDry Technology preserves 95% of a fruit or vegetable's nutritional content, maintains its flavor and forgoes conventional dehydration techniques like hot-air or freeze-drying.

🏭  The dried fruit and vegetable maker has gone deep into private label snacks since taking the company public last year and serves c-stores as well as mass retail and club stores like Walmart and Costco.

Mondelēz International outlined plans to implement additional price hikes to combat cocoa supply chain inflation during its FY 2023 earnings call yesterday. Despite the upcoming increases, CEO Dirk Van De Put said the company had its “best year ever” in 2023 citing a “record” gross profit of $2.2 billion. Here’s a look at the results:

• Biscuits and baked snacks grew 11.9% in 2023 and contributed 49% of the company’s total revenue.
• Chocolate segment sales were up 14.5% in the year; the category makes up roughly one-third of Mondelēz’s overall business. 
• North America organic net revenue grew 9.5% driven by price growth. 

⏩ For the year ahead: Van De Put told investors that price hikes – particularly in the U.S. and Europe – will be necessary to offset the dollar impact of inflation on input costs. 

Read more about Mondelez’s plans for the upcoming year on Nosh. 

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced an expansion of its public-private partnership with grocery delivery company Instacart today. The partnership is part of the Biden Administration’s push to create intervention techniques that improve health outcomes utilizing “food as medicine” and increase access to nutritious food.

🤝 This is an extension of Instacart’s Health initiative, created in partnership with the White House, after its 2022 Conference on Hunger, Nutrition and Health; the expansion was announced during the inaugural HHS Food As Medicine Summit this morning.

🏛️ The initiative is centered around four pillars: advancing research based on positive clinical health outcomes, developing implementation strategies through public-private funding, education and increasing health equity across communities.