Spread the word: the vegan answer to posh butter has arrived. Upfield has expanded its dairy-free Flora Plant B+tter range with a Smoked Garlic flavour, in a claimed “industry first”. The new variant (rsp: £1.75/125g) will launch into 250 Sainsbury’s stores from 29 September.

The brand is keen to tap British fondness for the pungent bulb. “We know the UK loves garlic in their food,” notes Ian Hepburn, UK marketing director at Upfield. “It has always been an ambition to bring this iconic flavour to our product range.”

But as Hepburn also points out, this is about much more than garlic – “flavoured butters have definitely become a dynamic part of the category”. With its latest launch, Flora has clearly seen an opportunity for plant-based spreads to jump on the culinary trend.

The momentum started when chef Thomas Straker turned flavoured butter into an overnight TikTok sensation last year. The videos of Straker’s handmade flavours – including the likes of shrimp butter and tomato, chilli and fennel butter – were enough to break the resolve of even the most cholesterol-conscious. On the back of that viral publicity, his brand All Things Butter secured its first in-store supermarket listings, in Sainsbury’s and Asda, in March.

@thomas_straker Tabasco butter - Louisiana shrimp vibes #butter #allthingsbutter #fyp #foodtok ♬ original sound - Thomas Straker

The trend has also made its mark in M&S, which tapped celebrity chef Tom Kerridge to sell its chilli butter as an accompaniment to dishes like vegetable curries. As Hamish Renton, MD of food consultancy HRA Global, told The Grocer in May: “There’s a bit of a revolution happening within culinary butters… and it’s growing really fast.”

Low in volume, high in talkability

Flora’s foray into that revolution is a milestone. As the third largest player in the butters and spreads category, it shifted nearly 23 million kilos last year, generating just shy of £97m. In other words, this is no challenger brand – it’s about as mainstream as it gets.

And its plans don’t stop at garlic. More savoury flavours are in the pipeline as limited editions in 2025, according to Flora, which will keep the ones that perform best. 

Such an on-trend launch in the plant-based spreads sphere  – which is notably lacking in flavour innovation – could help generate some excitement around the Flora brand. It’s arguably needed after a lukewarm performance in 2023, when the brand grew value by 4.8% but saw units fall 1.4% [NIQ 52 w/e 24 February 2024].

Granted, it’s unlikely to be a high-volume line. At £1.75/125g, Flora’s garlic flavour comes out at £14/kg. That’s more than double the cost of Flora’s Original, which retails at £2.50/450g – a mere £5.50/kg. And more on a par with luxury butter Isigny Ste Mère, which comes in at £3.70/250g or £14.80/kg.

But even if sales are a small proportion of Flora’s portfolio, the line establishes the brand as an innovator with its finger on the pulse. And in a market that is low on exciting NPD and differentiation, that could be a decisive move.

Pola is The Grocer’s trends editor. She manages our weekly Focus On reports explaining the ‘how’ and ‘why’ behind shifting currents in what we eat and drink. Before jumping into retail journalism in January 2024, Pola worked for Times Higher Education, where she was was Asia reporter and co-editor of THE’s global university rankings supplement – a gig that offered plenty of opportunities for fantastic meals in the Far East. Since graduating from Columbia University’s journalism school in 2015, Pola has lived in Japan and rural Alaska, covered the US senate, and written about satellite imagery for Nasa. She has a weakness for biang biang noodles with chilli oil.View full Profile

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