Philadelphia cream cheese with Cadbury chocolate - a launch with potential?

Today I heard about this interesting co-branding launch by Kraft Foods. It has been two years since Kraft Foods acquired Cadbury, and now Kraft Foods is joining two of its most famous brands together by marrying Britain’s most famous chocolate brand with Philadelpia cream cheese. And Kraft has high hopes for the new launch targeting £10m in sales in the first year alone.

In the UK this product will be launched in February 2012. And it will be merchandised next to the other chilled cheese spreads and the plain Philadelphia. It will be sold in a 160g tub and a 120g four-pack of mini tubs (both rsp: £1.62). The launch will be supported with a £3.2m marketing budget.

In Germany and Italy Kraft already offers chocolate variants of Philadelphia through the Milka chocolate brand. And in those markets they focus on the breakfast occasion. The interesting thing here is that in these markets consumers are already used to using chocolate spread - Nutella is very popular in both Germany and Italy. I now look forward to see how the Brits and the country of Marmite respond to the idea of sweet rather than savoury on their toasts..

And in the UK Kraft has understood that they cannot position the Philadelphia Cadbury spread against the same occasion as in those markets. Instead consumer research has identified Philadelphia with Cadbury as a snack, rather than as a breakfast spread. The question is if the 'snack' occasion will be big and interesting enough to pursue in the longer term... Time will tell...