Two years after its controversial acquisition of Cadbury, Kraft Foods is taking Britain’s most famous chocolate brand in a new direction - by combining it with cheese.

The company is bringing together two of its most iconic brands by launching Philadelphia with Cadbury, a chilled chocolate spread made from Philadelphia Light and Cadbury chocolate. Kraft has high hopes for the new product and is targeting £10m in sales in the first year alone.

The spread hits the mults on 1 February and will be merchandised in the chilled dairy aisle next to plain Philadelphia Light. It will be sold in a 160g tub and a 120g four-pack of mini tubs (both rsp: £1.62).

Kraft is supporting the launch with a £3.2m marketing budget in 2012 and is targeting 2,000 tonnes in volume sales - equivalent to about £10m - in the first year. This would take Philadelphia with Cadbury to the same market value as Garlic & Herb, currently the biggest-selling flavour in the Philadelphia portfolio.

Kraft already offers chocolate variants of Philadelphia in Italy and Germany, using Milka chocolate and targeting the breakfast occasion. In Germany, Philadelphia with Milka has generated €22.2m in sales since its October 2010 launch and has a 6.6% value share of the chocolate spread market [Nielsen].

Kraft Foods UK marketing manager Bruce Newman said the UK product would be positioned as a snack. “The breakfast market in countries such as Germany is more developed, and our consumer research firmly identified Philadelphia with Cadbury as a snack,” he said.

Philadelphia with Cadbury contains 86 calories per 30g serving compared with Nutella’s 160 and would, Newman said, primarily target “guilty snackers” - women aged 25 to 40 who wanted to eat healthily but were also after an indulgent snack.

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