US (CA): Blue Diamond looking for more almond products
The center is intended to lead Blue Diamond's efforts to develop new almond products. The company — which has a plant in Salida and is building another in Turlock — also laid down a welcome mat for global food companies that want to explore the potential benefits of almond products worldwide.
Mark Jansen, president and chief executive officer of the 103-year-old Sacramento-based cooperative, called the facility "the world's only research center dedicated to designing cutting-edge almond products."
Almonds are the state's top food export, thanks in part to new uses developed by the Blue Diamond cooperative. A dozen new products are slated for production in the next six months.
Working in comparatively humble labs, Blue Diamond research and development workers have been developing almond products that previous generations might have considered unlikely — everything from non-dairy beverages to Blazin' Buffalo Wing-flavored almonds in a can.
John O'Shaughnessy, Blue Diamond's general manager for North American retail operations, said last Thursday that all new branded almond products introduced over the past 10 years were produced by Blue Diamond.
He said the cooperative, owned by 3,000-plus growers, has introduced a dozen new almond products in the United States alone over the past six months. A dozen are set to debut in the next six months.
Now, development will be done in a pristine center that resembles a hybrid of a massive hotel kitchen and a top-tier medical research facility. The center is stocked with exotic-looking devices to measure taste, shelf life, pH levels, flavor coatings and much more.
Blue Diamond's ability to churn out new almond-based products has served it well.
Last year, it amassed all-time record sales of more than $1 billion. Year-over-year sales were up in multiple segments: snack almonds (up 21 percent), Nut Thins crackers (up 28 percent) and chilled almond milk (up 59 percent). Global sales of almond ingredients rose 35 percent.
Almonds are the state's No.1 food export — with China and Hong Kong topping the destination list, importing 236 million pounds of California almonds in 2011-12 — and Jansen said the strength of almond shipments "is directly attributable to new uses for almonds that our cooperative has created."
New almond snacks introduced this year include coffee and fruit-flavored products.
In past years, Sacramento officials feared that Blue Diamond might move further south into the heart of the Central Valley. Those concerns were raised in the fall of 2011 when Blue Diamond bought 88 acres in Turlock and subsequently started building a major manufacturing and processing facility.
However, Blue Diamond spokeswoman Susan Brauner said, "We've always been committed (to Sacramento). … Clearly, Blue Diamond has invested in building its global capabilities and located its Almond Innovation Center in Sacramento."
Source: modbee.com
