Hillshire plans aggressive frozen breakfast expansion

CHICAGO — Hillshire Brands will introduce new products in the frozen breakfast category over the next few years in an effort for the company to become the most innovative meat-centric food company throughout North America.

According to the Chicago Tribune, Hillshire, backed by an enhanced marketing and advertising campaign, will offer new easy-to-heat breakfast bowls, quesadillas, burritos and egg sandwiches.

"Historically, a lot of our energy in [the] R&D team and the supply chain team was focused on taking costs out of our products," said Hillshire Brand's CEO, Sean Connolly. "Now we've got a healthy balance between innovation and growth as well as the need to always be efficient in our operations."

The company set a goal of its new products to comprise 13% to 15% of sales by 2015. Their current marketing, advertising and promotions budget will leap from the current 3.5% to 5% within that same timeframe.

Hillshire Brands, formerly Sara Lee, offers a wide variety of goods through their many brands: Jimmy Dean, Hillshire Farm, Ball Park, Aidells, Gallo Salame and State Fair, and is a U.S.-based company.