Interview with Guillaume Dock, vice president R&D, Greater Europe, with Campbell Soup Company

Tell us about yourself and your career history

I’m 42 and I’ve always worked in the food industry. I did an engineering degree at the INA PG food and agronomic school in Paris. After I graduated I got a job working on chocolate-coated ice cream bars at Dove Europe, which is owned by Mars. Then I went to the West Indies to take on a quality role within ice cream manufacturing – working for a franchise of Miko. I spent two years there and then moved back to France where I took a job with Danone, developing soups and sauces under the Liebig brand. Campbell’s acquired Liebig in 1997 and since then I’ve been working for Campbell Soup Company. Initially I continued my role as a technology and packaging developer. Then after a year I moved to operations and led production for a plant in the south of France for six years. After this I was promoted to R&D and quality director for Campbell’s France, a role which I did for three or four years before being made vice president R&D for Greater Europe, four years ago.

What does you current role as vice president R&D, Greater Europe, entail?

I manage all R&D for Campbell’s Europe and coordinate activities with our mother company in the US. My role involves a lot of product development – from line extensions to new soup varieties, new packaging and new product formats, as well as leading technology research programmes, especially around aseptic production. There is also a cost optimisation aspect to my job, which involves reformulating with new ingredients and finding cheaper solutions.

I oversee four teams across Europe – we have about 60 people working in R&D in Europe. They are organised around technology platforms: retort, aseptic, sauces and dried products. Each technology platform serves all markets in Europe.

To what extent is NPD from North America rolled out in Europe and vice versa?

The company has an R&D centre in Camden, Philadelphia, which employs over 200 people. We maintain close links with the centre to make sure that we can benefit from research that is being carried out there.

That said, there is no such thing such as a global product in the soup category - every country has its own recipes, packaging and regulations. It’s not like in beverage, snacks or confectionery where you find products that can apply to several different countries. Soups are so closely linked with cultural heritage that every country has its own soups. For example, in Germany soup is like a stew and is heavily garnished with lots of chunks whereas in France most soups are vegetable puree-style soups, so you cannot create the same products for both markets.

How many new products do you develop each year?

We ‘touch’ 70% of our products every year, but much of this is refreshing existing products with new formats and recipes. In terms of new SKUs in Europe, we probably develop in the region of 100 per year. Of these, about 30 are what we would consider really new products.

What projects are you working on at present?

We’ve just launched a new heavily garnished soup in a carton for the Belgian market under our DeliSoup brand and are looking to roll it out across Europe. It uses a new processing and packaging technology that makes it taste like a freshly made soup with lots of crunchy vegetables but enables it to be stored for 12 months on the shelf. We can’t say what the technology is, but it’s something new we’ve worked on with SIG Combibloc – our partner in this area.

I understand that condensed soups have just been re-introduced to the UK market. What was the thinking behind this decision? Are the soups exactly as they were originally or have the recipes been altered at all?

We relaunched our condensed soups in the UK in August in response to customer feedback that they missed our soups, as we had been out of the market for a few years. People use condensed soup as an ingredient in other meals, such as bakes, curries and hot pots, so obviously people notice quickly if the flavour or product quality changes. Our new condensed soups have been developed to meet the UK regulations for sodium content which have been introduced in the past few years. So we have reduced sodium levels by around 20% and moved to natural flavourings and colouring – there is no MSG in the product.

What is the relationship between Campbell Soup Company and Campbell’s in the UK? Is it still owned by Premier Foods?

No, we have no connection with Premier Foods. Campbell’s sold its UK business to Premier Foods in 2006, but not the Campbell’s brand. Under the terms of the deal, Campbell's granted Premier a two year licence to produce Campbell's condensed soup. This agreement expired in 2008. Now, Campbell’s sells a range of soups in the UK, including condensed, ready to serve and dry soups. 

Which European markets are the most important for you?

Our two largest markets are France and Germany; we are also present in Belgium, Sweden and Finland. We have a growing business in the UK and our products are sold in other countries in Europe through a distributor network.

What have you been doing in terms of sugar, salt and fat reduction and removal of additives and preservatives from products?

Our products don’t contain much fat or sugar so most of our reformulation efforts have focused on sodium reduction and clean label work. Our approach varies from product to product – there’s no magical ingredient you can apply to all products. Most of the time we reduce sodium levels by enhancing the flavour part of the recipe. We work very closely with our partner flavour house whenever we need cleaner label products because the one thing we don’t want to jeopardise is the taste.

The amount of sodium we’ve taken out of products varies from country to country. In France, we have had a sodium reduction programme for 10 years. There we’ve reduced sodium levels by around 10% and we started from a point that was far lower than the UK standard four years ago. With sodium reduction, you have to bear in mind what the starting point was, and what the consumer acceptance is like. In France we have been able to reduce sodium by using spices, but in Germany it is very difficult because consumers really like salty products, and there isn’t currently regulatory pressure to make any changes. In the UK sodium levels went down very sharply because there was a regulatory push - if everyone moves in the same direction at the same pace it’s easier to educate consumers and maintain their acceptance. We have started working to reduce sodium in some recipes in Germany but at a different rate and starting from a higher point than other countries.

Besides sodium reduction we’ve been making our products more natural or ‘clean label’, for example by moving from modified starch to more natural starch and moving away from MSG. Some countries even have some issues with yeast extract that we’ve addressed. In addition we have removed trans fats from almost all our products.

Canned soup is a declining segment in most European markets. What are you doing to offset this threat?

More than 70% of our portfolio in Europe is packaged in cartons, squeeze bottles and sachets, so locally we use a wide variety of packaging. While cans have met consumer needs for many years we have also seen younger consumers choosing other formats, as packaging technology has developed and evolved. 

We’re looking at alternatives to cans where it makes sense, for example products in plastic bowl shaped containers and pouches, made using both retort and aseptic production technologies.

Cans are still an effective and environmentally sound form of packaging, so we will continue to use them, as well as diversifying our packaging to give people a choice. 

To what extent are you focusing your R&D on categories other than soup?

We have bouillon cubes in Belgium, liquid bouillon concentrate in Sweden, dried casserole/sauce mixes in Finland, mayonnaise in Belgium; we even do a small volume of ketchup; so we have quite an extensive range of products. We’re spending more and more time on adjacent categories where we’re looking to create something different either through convenience and quality. We’re working on several exciting projects which we hope to bring to market in the next year or so.

In your opinion, which are the most exciting Campbell's products at present from an innovation point of view and why?

In France, we’ve developed a range of premium soups with some promising young chefs. The recipes they’ve developed are inspired by the region where the chefs own restaurants and use indulgent ingredients. In the US we’ve just launched a new range of soups called Slow Kettle. These are soups that use premium ingredients and are slowly simmered to preserve the flavour and texture of the ingredients. 

What soup products do you think we will see more of in future?

Firstly, I think more hearty soups will continue to be popular as people move away from having soup as a starter. So we’re looking at how we can adjust the design of our products in line with this trend, looking at new recipes that have more proteins and pastas.

There is also a trend in terms of household composition - families are smaller, there are more singles living alone and more two person households. We’re addressing that by adjusting our packaging formats. Sales of a range of soups in 750ml packs, a size which is perfect for two generous bowls of soup, have been strong, as have duo single packs of 330ml.

We’re also seeing people wanting to take a more active role in the preparation of meals, preferring to have help with preparing soups rather than being presented with ready to serve soups.