Too much value engineering can spoil the broth, warn food technologists

Manufacturers have been warned against slashing the quality of ingredients in their products in attempts to offset soaring costs.

While rising costs were putting margins under pressure, excessive value engineering could end up damaging products and reputations while increasingly cash-strapped consumers made far more significant changes to their purchasing behaviour, warned product development experts quizzed by FIHN​.

Indeed, many food technologists and chefs we spoke to for our report on value engineering feared that it had already gone too far - causing serious damage to well established brands.

In the case of economy ranges, there was no more fat left to trim anyway, said Steve Rice, md of market researcher RTS Resource. "How can you take cost out of something that has already had all its added value removed?"

While the big brands had more clout with customers, own-label suppliers had more flexibility to drop lines and create new ones with better margins if their sums stopped adding up, said one technologist. However, own-label firms also had less freedom in some cases as supermarkets increasingly stipulated which suppliers and ingredients they were allowed to use.

Meanwhile, harsh times have also encouraged manufacturers to become more creative with their ingredients, especially in confectionery, where firms have been using polyglycerol polyricinoleate (an emulsifier from castor beans) to "thin down" chocolate coatings, said one development chef.