Red velvet Oreos to hit stores soon as Mondelez chases foodies

NEW YORK – Mondelez International Inc. plans to introduce red velvet Oreos, the cookie brand’s second departure from chocolate in more than 100 years, in a bid to win over foodies and cupcake fanatics.

The new Oreos, made with red cookies and cream cheese- flavored filling, will be released across the U.S. on Feb. 2, Deerfield, Ill.-based Mondelez said in an e-mailed statement. The new product was developed for more than a year and will be sold at U.S. stores for at least six weeks or while supplies last.

Mondelez’s Nabisco began selling vanilla-flavored golden Oreos in 2009, straying from chocolate cookies for the first time since the snack was invented in 1912. Red velvet Oreos, hitting shelves in time for Valentine’s Day, will test U.S. consumers’ appetite for a flavor that’s gained a following in recent years.

“We’ve seen consumers really getting fanatical about the flavor of red velvet cake,” Janda Lukin, senior director for Oreo North America at Mondelez, said in a phone interview. “We think it stays true to who we are as Oreo but can also really satisfy those folks who are red velvet fanatics.”

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Sales of Oreos doubled worldwide from 2007 to 2011 and climbed to $2.4 billion in 2013, Mondelez said.

As foodie culture seeps into the mainstream, Americans are developing “restless palate syndrome,” said Michael Whiteman, president of Baum & Whiteman International Restaurant Consultants in New York. He said red velvet will join pumpkin spice as big packaged-food flavor trends this year.

“We’ve become flavor junkies,” Whiteman said in an e- mail. “That’s part of why you see red velvet staining everything from onion rings to waffles to ice cream to cocktails – especially around St. Valentine’s Day.”

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