Building a pipeline around American snackers’ tastes.

The challenge

Most Haribo products were developed in Europe, so the U.S. pipeline was thin. With a new U.S. plant, Haribo wanted a repeatable way to create products for American snackers.

200+

new product ideas

places to hunt for growth

ideas on the launch roadmap

The situation

Building a U.S. pipeline from scratch

Haribo's U.S. innovation had mostly come from Europe, which kept the pipeline limited. A new U.S. manufacturing plant changed what was possible. To use it, Haribo needed to understand American snackers and a way to turn that into products.

How we did it

Step 1

Map the category

A deep look at gummies, sugar and candy: where demand is heading, how the market is moving, and what drives snackers.

Step 2

Meet the snacker

Small groups and one-on-one conversations about what people buy and why. We built five shopper types and validated hypotheses with a segmentation study.

Step 3

Create with the team

Ideation with Haribo's team, grounded in the research. The best ideas went back to consumers for feedback.

Step 4

Test fast

Lightning Strike, our agile concept test, checked the strongest concepts across core and new categories.

What we learned

How American snackers are different.

The research showed where U.S. snackers differ from Haribo's international audiences, where they buy, and which kinds of new products resonate with them. It also gave Haribo seven places to hunt for growth.

What changed

A process Haribo can run again.

Haribo's team now has a repeatable way to find and develop U.S. products. More than 200 seed ideas were sorted and sequenced, and five products were placed on Haribo's innovation roadmap for future launch.