The details of the partnership were revealed during NutraIngredients' Sports & Active Nutrition Summit in Amsterdam last week (Oct 5-7) in a session which shocked even the host of the event.
The "exciting" opportunity for sports nutrition within the grocery sector was outlined by Adam Leyland, editor-in-chief at the Grocer, who said: “The grocers themselves have engaged in sports nutrition and the way they are doing so has really changed – the seriousness with which they are taking it is really fascinating.
“Historically this has been a specialist, niche area and when supermarkets have stocked these products in the past they have done so in the dusty shelves in the back where people rarely visit. Now we see them bringing it to the forefront and that is really exciting.”
Bringing Leyland’s point to life, Andrew Staniland, trading director at Iceland, joined the event virtually and revealed that plans made with The Hut Group and MyProtein that have been three years in the making will finally materialise on shelves in just a few months time.
“We are late to sports nutrition but this is about us taking the leading protein brand in the UK and creating a range which will allow the nation to come into our stores and pick up convenient meal preparation solutions. We want to join the market with a bang, layering in a new footfall for us that we might not ordinarily enjoy.”
New products in stores will include ready meals which are high in protein and low in fat and sugar, as well as high protein, low fat pizzas, high protein ice cream with no sugar, and some cooked chicken products. They will also bring some of MyProtein's core ambient products to their shelves.
“We did take inspiration from what’s already on the market but we also looked at what growth categories exist in the market and looked at if we could provide a high protein version of those to almost exaggerate and compliment the high protein nutrition market and bring a new brand into the grocery retail space."
Staniland added that they have high hopes for this partnership after their successful 10 year partnership with Slimming World which saw the brand grow from zero to £80million in three years.
“We don’t see any reason why it can’t be as big as Slimming World over the next three years. The size of the global market, the UK market, the loyal customer base that MyProtein has gives it a strong tail wind to be able to match that of the Slimming World metrics that we’ve seen.”
Chair of the event, Nick Morgan, director of Sports Integrated, demonstrated what a powerful message this sends to the sports nutrition industry saying: "I won't say you've blown my mind but I definitely think you've given it a little punch!"