Sustainability built on action builds trust, the confectionery industry is discovering

Consumer confidence is more important than ever as the confectionery industry faces “turbulent times”, the head of Mars Wrigley Australia said in a speech at ConTech2024.

“First there was Covid, now we have inflationary pressures,” Andrew Leakey told these people Australian Industry Group confectionery event held earlier this month in Melbourne.

“Sugar and cocoa prices are high right now and we all have to deal with that.”

Leakey revealed how customer service helped Mars Wrigley Australia overcome the challenges of installing a recyclable paper Mars bar packaging line at its Ballarat factory during the height of the Covid pandemic, when international borders were closed.

“It was a brand new line that cost about $30 million and we had to install it using cameras, video and microphones because the engineers were based in the Netherlands,” he said.

“It was a big challenge. On the first day the efficiency was 66%, which is very low.

“It took us some time to get the machine up and running at the same time as we were switching to recyclable paper packaging.”

Cost pressures were also enormous.

“It will cost us four cents more per bar case,” Leakey said.

“Our factory in Ballarat produces 88 million Mars, Snickers and Milky Ways bars a year, or four cents times 88 million – you can do the math.

“But was it the right thing to do? Absolutely. Did we want to be the first in the world to do it? Yes. Did we need support from our communities and packaging suppliers? Yes.

“We decided to remove 360 ​​cubic tons of plastic from the supply chain every year, so it was absolutely the right thing to do.

“We should have completed the project about four times, but we didn’t.

“And while we didn’t achieve the transition to all-paper production in Phase 1 – we moved to 86% paper production with a thin layer of protective recyclable plastic – our goal is to achieve this by the end of next year.

“Our customers have supported us from day one. Sustainability built on action builds trust.”

Leakey also shared how artificial intelligence (AI) is becoming increasingly important in the confectionery sector when used alongside “real intelligence.”

“In the future, it is important to combine these two elements,” he said.

“I’ve seen some amazing technology, but to get value from it, you need a lot of operator capability to implement it in our factories.”

Artificial intelligence is used not only in innovation and new products, but also in keeping factories running, Leakey said.

“For example, we can no longer buy parts for some of our machines that are over 80 years old,” he said.

“We now have engineers who 3D print replacement parts.

“We have to look to the future. The skills of the past will not enable us to prepare for the needs of the factories of tomorrow.”

Leakey praised the Australian Industry Group confectionery team, in particular Tim Piper and Jennifer Thompson, for their support.

“They do a tremendous amount of work to keep our industry robust,” he said.

“We should be incredibly proud of the progress we are making and the resilience of our industry.”