Tesco has embarked on a major push into the adult cheese snacking sector as part of its latest cheese range review.

It has added six 30g own-label cheese snack bars - in mature Cheddar, Red Leicester, pesto, caramelised onion, chilli, and Wensleydale & cranberry flavours (rsp: 40p each) - and a 200g multipack snack bag (rsp: £2.50) to its cheese fixture.

In addition, it has listed a cheese snack pack containing cheese, oatcakes, fruit and chutney (rsp: £2) and cheese snacks with dips, such as feta dips with bruschetta and bread sticks, and mini Cheddar cubes with dip (rsp: £1).

“Whilst there is on-going innovation within snacking categories such as crisps, nuts and chocolate, historically the majority of product development in the cheese category has focused on children,” said category buying manager David Chamberlain. Adult cheese snacking had “massive growth potential,” added Dawn Smith, senior category manager at Adams Foods, which makes the snack bars for Tesco. “The new individual cheese bars we’ve developed for Tesco offer a variety of flavours and represent the perfect alternative to the usual snacking choices.”

Tesco is also capitalising on the growing trend for using cheese in cooking with a new ‘Entertaining’ range of cheese-based meals, which will be given two full shelves in the speciality pre-pack part of the cheese section of larger stores. They include Cheddar soufflés, halloumi with chilli and a kit to make goats cheese canapés.

“We’ve specifically designed this collection to bring cheese to life by tapping into the versatility of the category to cater for occasions, such as dinner parties and al fresco dining,” said Chamberlain.

The new lines started rolling out to stores on 21 April.

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