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Campbell’s Drops OU from its Vegetarian Vegetable Soup
Camden, NJ…Three years ago the Campbell Soup Company announced with great fanfare that its Vegetarian Vegetable Soup obtained kosher certification from the Orthodox Union(OU). Its President, Jeremy Fingerman, an Orthodox Jew, told KosherToday that the move was strategic to help a relatively static brand and to take advantage of the opportunities in a soaring kosher market. Now, KosherToday has learned, Campbell’s dropped the coveted OU symbol and instead moved to the California-based Kosher Overseers of America, which uses the Half Moon K symbol. According to Juli Mandel Sloves, the Senior Manager of Nutrition and Wellness Communication for Campbell’s, the move was made to “unify all the products that are made in our thermal processing plants.” Ms. Sloves added that the company had decided to certify the soup with the certification of the majority products, namely the half moon K. She noted that “we have a long standing relationship with the OU with other brands.” Pepperidge Farm and Godiva are still under OU supervision. But Mr. Fingerman, now the CEO of R.A.B. Foods, which includes such major kosher brands as Manischewitz and Rokeach, and other officials in the kosher food industry seemed puzzled by the Campbell’s move. In information obtained by KosherToday, it appeared that prior to the 2003 move to the OU, the Vegetarian Vegetable soup had been a good variety that had declined steadily over the years. The OU news and marketing activity generated double digit volume growth in the first year following certification, which was a performance Campbell even touted in its annual report that year. However, subsequent marketing support for the variety was cut, and the declining trend line continued. In addition, the need for the procurement department to generate cost savings provided a chance for the Half Moon K to low-ball the supervision bid and “win the business.” The move is not likely to sit well with consumers who were in fact waiting for the company to put more of their variety under the OU. The departure of Mr. Fingerman a few years ago appeared to stall the effort to bring more of the company’s soups under OU certification and now even the initial variety is no longer certified by the OU. The Kosher Overseers of America (Half Moon K) founded by the late Rabbi Harold Sharfman, certifies many products on the West Coast and in other markets and does not enjoy nearly the acceptance of the OU in the marketplace.