Halva makes its Bamba debut
Following peanut snack's rave success with nougat flavor, Osem continues to court adult audience, launching new sweet flavor – this time filled with halva cream
Peanut snack with halva – this is the new flavor Bamba is slated to launch in order to attract a more adult target audience.
Mamon, Yedioth Ahronoth's economic section, has learned that the new snack will be launched in two weeks. An ad campaign promoting the new flavor will start next week, starring the famous Bamba baby and will deliver the message: "Two things that you love – Bamba and halva."
As first published in Mamon a year ago, Osem decided first decided to market its nougat-flavored Bamba in honor of the Israel's 60th birthday. Following the flavor's rave reviews – mainly among the adult crowd – the company is following up with another sweet filling.
Bamba Halva will be sold alongside the nougat version at the same price – about NIS 4 -5 (about $1 - $1.30) for a 60 gram package.
Osem's salty snack outlay is the second largest in the company, and Bamba is one of its most profitable products. Because the snack has come close to exhausting its growth potential among children, the new flavors intend to attract a new audience, a bit older, who will view the new flavors as a sweet snack option.
The nougat-flavored Bamba's success resulted in the first growth in years in the peanut snack category. Bamba was the main beneficiary, with a 26.2% market share in Israel's salty snacks, up from 24% prior to the nougat flavor's launch, according to Nielsen's figures. In shekels, the salty snack category in 2009 stood at NIS 744.36 million (about $198.7 million), of which Bamba raked in some NIS 195 million ($52 million) following the nougat launch.
Another indication of Bamba's new sweet orientation is that Bamba Nougat alone currently represents about 5% of all sales in the snack category. For the sake of comparison, the entire range of Strauss and Pepsico's Doritos flavors also sit on 5% of the snack market.
The product was developed at Nestle's development center in Sderot through using the center's patented technology to fill the Bamba. The technology took two years to develop. The halva to be injected into the Bamba is supplied from an external manufacturer.
"There is a new need here that we have come to understand," said Ayelet Tzarfati-Rozen, director of Osem's snack department. "In a survey we conducted, we found that 30% of the nougat consumers see it as a sweet snack. More importantly, 20% of the nougat consumers were not Bamba consumers at all. From the company's standpoint, this is a huge success. We tested other flavors, and halva came out as the most loved. Our research shoed that 70% of Israelis like halva. The halva flavor received higher scores than the nougat flavor."
Tzarfati-Rozen confirmed that the new flavors are directed at an older audience. "If Bamba is your first snack, nougat and halva are directed at teenagers and above."
