• 🍪 DEUX Founder Moves On
• ❌ FDA Looking Into Red Dye Ban
• 💸 Alt-Cocoa Secures Sweet Capital
• 🍫 Hershey’s U.S. Confection President Steps Down
• 🥚 Post Holdings: HPAI Impacts 12% of Controlled Egg Supply

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KeHE has introduced a new opt-in fee structuring program that allows emerging brands to trade associated, first-year onboarding fees for a consistent 2% flat rate, a move intended to make the distribution powerhouse “easier and more cost effective” to work with.

Speaking at BevNET Live on Monday, KeHE senior category manager Christina Schmidt said the distributor introduced the new optional fee structuring program this month to help emerging brands simplify their spend forecasts with a consistent flat rate.

“We know that forecasting can be a really big challenge, especially when you're launching and you're a new and emerging brand – it's kind of a roller coaster as you kind of get started within that initial, first year launch…[This is a] control allowance that waives you from those initial fees associated with onboarding. That 2% is less than the actual experience of those wage fees, so it consolidates them all into one allowance to help you as a brand forecast better.”

Known as the administrative allowance program (AAP), the move is similar to the policy update implemented by competitor UNFI earlier this year. UNFI’s simplified supplier approach (SSA) policy, however, is not optional and consolidates a variety of fees into one 2.5% flat rate. 

UNFI’s policy update received mixed reactions; though conceptualized as a lifeline for emerging brands, the policy was rolled out for brands doing more than $100,000 in sales through UNFI’s system; brands generating less than that were excluded from the program. Additionally, it remains unclear which fees are included in UNFI’s 2.5% lump charge. 

Nosh Insiders can access the full story for all of the details on KeHE’s new program.

Sabeena Ladha, founder and CEO of DEUX, has moved on from the functional dessert business she launched and led for the past four years. In a social media post shared yesterday, she said that “as of last month, I’m no longer involved with DEUX.”

🥄 Ladha said the brand's refrigerated gluten-free cookie dough and donut holes are still available to buy online and in-store, but she declined to provide details about the DEUX's new operators and has not responded to our request for comment.

💬 “We fed millions of consumers. We made wellness more accessible. We empowered women. We met our icons. We became icons! We beat the odds," Ladha said.

Related Reading: ‘It Can’t Die’: Doughp Searches For New Operators

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) may be on the verge of banning synthetic food coloring additive Red No. 3., which is used to make food and beverages a vibrant red color, but made from petroleum byproducts that have been linked in some studies to hyperactivity disorder in children and increase a predisposition to cancer in rats. 

🔊 “With Red 3, we have a petition in front of us to revoke the authorization board, and we’re hopeful that in the next few weeks we’ll be acting on that petition,” said FDA deputy commissioner for human foods Jim Jones in a U.S. Senate health committee on Thursday.

🪧 In October, a group of protesters led by HumanCo CEO Jason Karp went to WK Kellogg’s headquarters in Battle Creek, Mich., to call on the food maker to remove food dyes from its products.

🏫 California has been at the forefront of the issue banning Red No. 3 last year and then moving further to ban Red No. 40 and five other synthetic dyes used in public school lunches this past September.

🏛️ Food dyes could be an early priority for the FDA if Robert F. Kennedy Jr. takes over as health secretary next year. He has supported efforts to remove synthetic additives in food including a U.S. Senate hearing on American Health and Nutrition in September.

With cocoa prices continuing to surge, more companies are betting on alternative cocoa products in moves to preserve the $100 billion chocolate industry. Last week, Israeli-based startup Celleste Bio and Munich-based B2B food tech company Planet A Foods received $4.5 million and $30 million in funding, respectively. 

👀 Celleste Bio – which uses cells extracted from cocoa plants and grown in bioreactors to produce cocoa powder – closed a seed round led by Supply Chain Capital with participation from Mondelēz International's SnackFutures Ventures, Consensus Business Group, and Trendlines Group. 

🗣️ What they said: "We have yet to feel the full scope and impact of climate change on how we grow and produce the world's food supply. That is why Trendlines is focused on finding and growing companies like Celleste that are pioneering technologies that can be applied and scaled to many critical crops in the future." - Nitza Kardish, CEO of Trendlines 

💰 Meanwhile, Planet A Foods raised a Series B round to fund its international expansion. The company, which markets a cocoa-free chocolate alternative called ChoViva, expects to launch in the U.K. in 2025, as reported by The Grocer. 

The Hershey Company is on the hunt for a new U.S. Confection president. Michael Del Pozzo, who led the business unit for four months, is departing the company to return to PepsiCo, where he had worked his entire career prior to joining Hershey.

🔍 In the interim, Hershey president and CEO Michele Buck will assume leadership of U.S. Confection as the company identifies Del Pozzo’s successor.

🤔 The announcement comes a day after Bloomberg News sparked speculation that Mondelēz International is exploring a potential acquisition of the company, sending Hershey’s shares upwards as much as 19% in intraday trading.

Catch Up Quick: Mondelēz Reportedly Exploring Hershey Takeover

CPG giant Post Holdings announced yesterday it has lost 12% of its controlled egg supply after an egg-laying flock of 4.5 million hens tested positive for avian flu at a Michael Foods third-party egg-laying facility.

📈 Despite the incident, Post has reaffirmed its outlook for fiscal year 2025 adjusted EBITDA of $1.41 billion to $1.46 billion. The company noted that the guidance range does not incorporate a “significant expansion of avian influenza” within its network, the impact of which is uncertain. 

⏪ The news comes just days after the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced a new federal order requiring the testing of the nation’s milk supply for the bird flu virus (H5N1).