By DEE-ANN DURBIN (AP Business Writer)
Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups are getting the vegan remedy.
The Hershey Co. mentioned Tuesday that Reese’s Plant Based Peanut Butter Cups, which go on sale this month, might be its first vegan candies offered nationally. A second plant-based providing, Hershey’s Plant Based Extra Creamy with Almonds and Sea Salt, will observe in April.
The candies are made with oats as a substitute of milk, Hershey mentioned.
Hershey has experimented with vegan chocolate earlier than. It offered an oat-based chocolate bar known as Oat Made in some take a look at markets beginning in 2021. But the brand new merchandise would be the first offered all through the U.S. below the “Plant Based” label.
Hershey mentioned shoppers need alternative and are on the lookout for merchandise they take into account more healthy or with fewer components, together with diminished sugar and plant-based choices. Hershey additionally launched an natural model of Reese’s Cups in February 2021.
Younger shoppers, specifically, wish to cut back consumption of animal-based merchandise, says Euromonitor, a market analysis agency. In a 2021 survey, Euromonitor discovered that 54% of Generation Z shoppers had been proscribing animal-based merchandise from their diets, in comparison with 34% of Baby Boomers.
Nestle has offered its KitKat V, a vegan KitKat bar, in Europe since 2021, whereas Cadbury sells a vegan chocolate bar within the United Kingdom. But up to now, U.S. vegan chocolate choices have usually been restricted to premium manufacturers, like Lindt, or natural chocolatiers like Hu Kitchen.
Hershey mentioned it developed plant-based variations of Reese’s Cups and Hershey bars — a few of its hottest merchandise — as a result of there’s a dearth of mainstream plant-based candies within the U.S. market.
The plant-based variations will value extra. Hershey wouldn’t share particulars as a result of it mentioned retailers set last costs. But Rite Aid lists a 1.4-ounce bundle of two plant-based Reese’s Cups at $2.49; that’s about $1 greater than shoppers would pay for an everyday bundle. Hershey expenses the same premium for natural variations of its Reese Cups, which went on sale in 2021.
And ditching the dairy gained’t lower energy. While Hershey didn’t launch the entire dietary info, the 1.4-ounce bundle of plant-based Reese’s Cups have 210 energy; that’s the identical variety of energy as a 1.5-ounce bundle of conventional Reese’s Cups.
Source: www.bostonherald.com”