What Is YoBark? Check Out The New Dairy Product Innovation Created By The Dairy Checkoff and General Mills Partnership

Host & Guest:

• Host: Scott Wallin, Vice President of Farmer Relations and Media Relations, Dairy Management Inc.
• Guest: Chris Urban, Vice President of Global Growth Platforms & Partnerships, Dairy Management Inc.

Transcript (AI-generated, please ignore the typos)

Scott Wallin   0:00  

Hi everybody. It's Scott Wallen with dairy management incorporated and welcome to another edition of the your dairy check off podcast where we speak with check off leaders and farmers about strategies that are driving sales and building trust of us, dairy and the farm families who make it all happen. Today, I'm joined by my colleague Chris urban, who serves as vice president of growth platforms and partnerships for dairy Management, Inc, Chris, how you doing today? I'm Great

Chris Urban   00:26

Scott. Thank you for having me on the podcast. Really excited to talk about the work that me and my team do on behalf of dairy farmers to drive value for dairy products with consumers. Absolutely

Scott Wallin   00:38

I know we're going to get into some of those details about a new product that is on the shelves right now that it's super exciting and very tasty as well. So we're going to get to that in a minute. But before we go there, let's hear a little bit about what do you and your team do on behalf of

Chris Urban 00:52

the check off, I work with General Mills. I'm the partner lead for General Mills. Um, and really what we do out through that context is we look for ways to partner with companies like General Mills that have, you know, a lot of consumer products, to come up with new innovations and new ideas to bring to market, to get consumers excited about dairy products and how they can fit better in their lives. And so that's sort of the consumer product side of the business, and then we also work in the food service side of the business. So you think about McDonald's and Domino's companies that are out there as quick serve restaurants that are a lot of great menu options. How do we continue to drive demand and innovation for their menus focused around dairy. We are really focused on innovation and new products that help drive demand and excitement for dairy with consumers.

Scott Wallin   01:47

You know, General Mills is one of those household names. Everybody has heard of General Mills. What's it like working with a company of that statue with that rich history? What are the synergies like with them?

Chris Urban 01:57

General Mills obviously brings a lot of expertise in the so yogurt is the category that we partner on with them, and so they have a lot of operational expertise and manufacturing. They bring a lot of expertise in consumer insights. What does the consumer want? And you know, branding and marketing and advertising and where it really comes together as we bring and build unique insights, both from where consumers are going in the space with the yogurt in particular, health and wellness has been a real area of focus for us with General Mills and the work that we've been doing with the IC coms, IC health and wellness committee and the comms committee on building the playbooks for health and wellness. But also we work with our scientists email national team on thinking about ways that we can incorporate new technologies into some of the products that bring new benefits to consumers, to help drive demand as well.

Scott Wallin   02:53

We've got a product on the shelves that has resulted from this partnership with General Mills. It's called yo bark. Can you kind of take us from A to Z concept, where we are today with yo bark. This

Chris Urban 03:05

is a perfect example of the collaboration that we do on behalf of farmers that really drives new ideas, new demand, new spaces for dairy, in the marketplace, in the grocery store. And really the idea came so General Mills came to us and they said, Hey, we're seeing on our business. You know, they have gogurt business, which is sort of more towards teens, and then the traditional yo play ratio businesses, which tend to have an older audience. And what they saw was that as kids sort of aged into the tween, the 1213, year old, there's a drop of consumption in yogurt. They just teens walk away from it for different reasons. And so the challenge back to us was, hey, can you help us figure out why they're leaving and in a way that we could keep them in the category? And so we started the work, partnering with them on understanding and uncovering the insights behind why teens and tweens lead the category, built that deep knowledge base, and then we work with them to take the reasons why, with the disappointments were to come up with a bunch of concepts. We had probably 20 concepts that we worked on and CO led and CO developed with them, and then we put those into consumer testing. And ultimately, yo bark was the top scoring concept that came out of the work that we did. And so we also helped them from find a manufacturing capability, right? This is a new this is a solid product. And so we helped identify the manufacturing do those pieces to help bring this thing to market. And it launched in October of this year, and

Scott Wallin   04:41

it's nationwide and it's in the refrigerated section. Come on and but can you talk a little bit about where we can find this product? It's in the

Chris Urban 04:49

refrigerated case. It is where you would find products like go Gert, and it is right now. So we started, retailers are on reset windows throughout the year. We. Launched the product in October. It started shipping it in Safeway, Albertsons, Jewel in Chicago. Walmart is another retailer where it where it picked up. And then, as retailers start to have resets at the beginning of this year, in 2025 you're going to start to see it showing up in more retailers nationwide.

Scott Wallin   05:18

You know, I love the idea that this is something that's going to compete with some of those unhealthy snacks out there, and it's mom and kid friendly Tina talk a little bit more about that and how exciting that is to have something on the shelves that has dairy and is healthy.

Chris Urban 05:31

Yes. So the insight, going back to that of the what was the idea behind the product, is kids tend, teens tend to leave the product because they're looking for things that are sort of more on the go and shareable, right? And so when you get into things that are more on the go and shareable, you start to get into salty snacks, and, you know, chips and cookies and pretzels and things like that. And mom doesn't necessarily feel great about that. She would love them to keep eating yogurt. And so it is this tension in this age range of kids wanting something that's probably a little bit more indulgent, more on the go, more poppable, shareable with their friends, and mom still wants them to be healthy and eat something that's going to give them a good nutrient profile. And so the nexus of those two things brought together when you can find something that is shareable, poppable and it's healthy. Mom feels good about it. It's the it's a sweet spot, and so that's where yo bark fits in perfectly. This is, you know, the bark is shareable. It's in a stand up pouch. It's poppable. They can eat it when they come home from school, as they're gaming with their friends. They can share it. And it's the goodness of yogurt. So moms feel great about it. So it's a perfect a compliment or a solution for both of those cohorts that we're really excited about. And to your point, it's really exciting because it takes dairy into a new space. So as you think about what we're trying to do as DMI, and what we're trying to do with our partners, is to bring and to go into new spaces with dairy. And to be able to go into something that goes into salty snacks and snacks and take dairy into that occasion, is really exciting in a really great incremental way, to bring dairy to consumers lives. You

Scott Wallin   07:14

know, Chris, I had the opportunity to speak with you and your counterpart at General Mills earlier. And you know, you can just certainly sense the teamwork, you know, that we have with them. Can you talk a little bit more about how they perceive the dairy check off and what we were able to bring to the table that maybe they're not able to do on their own?

Chris Urban 07:32

They view us as partners. I think that's really they view it as strategic partners that bring them insights and knowledge and technology and dairy that is unique, that helps further their business. And so some examples of of obviously, yo bark is a great example of that. But as we think about partnering with them into 2026, and beyond, they have a pipeline of new products across their brands that they're building, and the partnership is really, where are we bringing unique insights for them in these spaces from all the things that you're hearing, weight management, GLP, one, how is GLP one, the lot of the great consumer insights that we have as DMI to understand that space, bringing that to them, to help them influence the new products, how they think about claims and bundles and packaging that they're Putting together, to the work that we're doing through the IC committee on health and wellness, talking about messaging and building what it consumes, what really resonates with consumers in these health and wellness spaces, and how best can we build the bundle with that to thinking about new new technologies and platforms that email is working on that can work brilliantly in the yogurt portfolio that brings new benefits to the consumer. So it's really a very strong partnership where we talk through what their innovation pipeline, their platform is, and what insights and information we can bring to make it stronger, to ultimately make consumers choose those products over other choices in the marketplace.

Scott Wallin   09:02

So, Chris, I'm curious, you mentioned 2026 in that response. I think that speaks to how far down the road you guys are already planning. Can you just talk a little bit about that?

Chris Urban 09:13

Absolutely, it's, it's so. So as you think about a retail reset and working with General Mills, a lot of the plans for 25 are set right. So it's so yo bark is going to be a key focus for 2025 it takes a lot to do that on General Mills. We have to do set when you have a new product, you have to sell it in, you have to have hit sort of reset windows of when retailers reset their their categories, reset their shelves. So any sort of innovation window in, we're looking usually a year or two out. So 2026 2027 because what's in 2025 is sort of the cake is baked and yo bark is there. We've done the selling in 2024 the resets happened in 2025 and so. We think about new innovation that comes to the marketplace. We're now pivoting to 2026 2027 and beyond. Well, we certainly

Scott Wallin   10:06

want to take time to celebrate yo bark. But I know you and your team are always looking ahead down the road to see what's next. What can you talk about? You know, as far as what's on the horizon for us that you guys are discussing,

Chris Urban 10:17

we're really excited about. Yo bark is a new brand, a new platform, and new form, and to the to the to that occasion. And so we will continue to work with General Mills on thinking about what's, what's beyond the two SKUs that we've launched in yo bark, what are, what are other iterations that we can go to continue to expand that business as it's it's successful in the marketplace. And then the other places that we will be spending more time with them is really focused on their ratio brand. So this is a brand that really looks at the right bundle of nutrients to meet needs for different consumers. So right now, there's a skew that's focused on keto. It's the right balance if you're on the keto diet, as you know, pro yogurt is a fantastic source of high quality protein with a rich nutrient bundle. And so there are a lot of areas that we can go with ratio in that business to continue to help them grow there. And then the other business that we're working on we'll focus on with them, is we, and if you're not familiar with we, it's a French style yogurt in a glass pot, and more premium. And so there are a lot of spaces as we think about premiumization in the marketplace, there are a lot of areas that we will continue to explore with them in that innovation pipeline space, and continuing to work with email and the science team on new and breakthrough science and technologies that really can help us elevate and better meet consumer needs and demands in those spaces.

Scott Wallin   11:40

You know, I love that you touched on the science aspect of that in emails team our colleague, Emil, how critical is the science to all this that you do?

Chris Urban 11:50

Very critical because the science, it's a link, right? So as you think about where consumer demand, particularly in these spaces of health and wellness, there is a linkage back to what can be done around claims and messaging and specific science and the and to help harness the power of dairy in new ways, to bring new solutions to meet those needs, and particularly in health and wellness. And so it's a critical link for us, for us, as we partner with General Mills to continue to make sure that dairy is front and center, and we're really continuing to win and that what's our birthright, which is, which is health and wellness and protein and the nutrient bundle that we have. You know, absolutely,

Scott Wallin   12:34

National Dairy Council, around for more than a century, has that clout and that powerful reputation that I have to think, you know, a company like General Mills looks at and says, Okay, if this is coming through National Dairy Council with, with this rich history of science and research, we're good with that is that, is that kind of what you see, you know, from General Mills,

Chris Urban 12:54

what, what helps is the fact that we are linked and and and work with the USDA is A lot of the work that we do is validated the research, the evidence based statements, and we validate those pieces with USDA. And in a lot of ways, we are helping to do a lot of the leg work for General Mills in providing the science summaries the approved pieces through the USDA that they can then take and use either in their products or in their messaging. So it's a critical piece, and they look for us to give the guidance and expertise to help keep those those pieces moving for them. Well, Chris,

Scott Wallin   13:28

I really enjoyed this conversation, and yo barks, amazing. Congratulations on all the success to you and your team. I know we sampled it at our joint angle meeting last fall, and so many dairy farmers had an opportunity to taste it, and I know you got some great feedback from them. So continued success with all that you do. Dairy farmers, if you want to learn more about your dairy check off, please visit Dairy checkoff.com where we also have more episodes of The your dairy check off podcast. Thanks again for your time. Chris,

Chris Urban 13:57

thank you. Scott.