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General Mills CEO: We are 'innovating on how we innovate' through AI

Artificial intelligence (AI) tools are adding speed, depth and innovative angles to several areas of business at General Mills and will prove invaluable in enhancing brand traction globally, its CEO says.

According to a United Nations Trade & Development (UNCTAD) report, the AI market is projected to hit US$4.8 trillion by 2033 and emerge as a “dominant frontier in technology”, reshaping a plethora of industries, from content creation and product design to automated coding and customer services.

And as AI tools become more widely available to consumers and industry alike many big food and beverage brands are leaning into these technologies to improve business.

“AI and digital integration will continue to be powerful drivers of innovation,” Jeffrey Harmening, chairman and CEO of General Mills, told analysts at the recent Consumer Analyst Group of New York (CAGNY) 2026 conference.

Amidst a “challenging operating backdrop, characterised by historically low consumer sentiment, heightened uncertainty and significant volatility”, Harmening said General Mills is working extra hard on innovation to bolster its global food and pet food businesses.

Today, the company is specifically focused on responding to consumer needs and amplifying its global brand “remarkability”, he said, in a bid to restore consistent and profitable sales growth.

Innovation means investing in ideas that resonate with consumers

“One of the most significant ways we're driving remarkability for consumers this year is through innovation,” the CEO said. “And that doesn't just mean launching new products; it also means innovating on how we innovate, by investing in our capabilities to deliver bigger, more impactful ideas that resonate with consumers.”

Crucially, he said General Mills is leaning into AI to achieve this. “We're now leveraging artificial intelligence to support new product development: from using digital personas to better understand consumers and customer problems; to image generation that creates prototypes in seconds; to conversation tools that can get real human consumer feedback faster than ever.

“Our teams are now moving from generating hundreds of potential consumer solutions to thousands, helping improve the quality of our ideas while increasing our speed of idea generation.”

And this work with AI, Harmening said, is being built on top of the company's existing digital infrastructure and integrated into existing business models – from NPD and innovation through to marketing and consumer outreach and even global supply chain operations.

General Mills: An ‘audience-first’ business model, backed by AI data

In marketing, for example, General Mills is using AI to determine which brands and messages within its global portfolio should be targeted to which consumer audiences, he explained, which shifts the company to an “audience-first model” backed by AI data.

“This portfolio-based targeting approach is helping us drive a nearly 40% improvement in the cost of acquiring incremental households and a 14-point increase in the share of buyers that are new to our brands–ultimately resulting in higher incremental sales for General Mills.”

How can food brands leverage agentic commerce?

From a consumer standpoint, the company is tracking how fast the shopping experience is evolving in light of AI tools now available to shoppers.

“AI is reshaping product discovery through agentic commerce, where AI-powdered tools help consumers discover, choose and purchase food and pet products,” Harmening said, so General Mills is looking at this and aligning its innovation agenda, portfolio choices and capability investments accordingly.

On the supply chain side, he said the company is using AI tools to digitalise entire operational structures. “We built a connected data foundation, deployed autonomous planning and implemented AI-enabled execution in logistics and manufacturing. These tools have helped us optimise throughput, reduce waste and improve service.”

Kofi Bruce, chief financial officer at General Mills, said these digital and AI initiatives on the supply chain side have also generated significant savings for the company and will contribute to a further 4% savings for fiscal 2027.