For more than three decades, Ravi Foods Pvt. Ltd. (RFPL) has built its presence in India’s baked goods and confectionery market through Dukes, alongside its other brands, Treff and Dynas. What began as a biscuits business in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana in 1995 has evolved into a multi-category operation with 17 manufacturing facilities, a pan-India footprint and exports to more than 120 countries. Today, Dukes is focused on reinforcing its established biscuits and wafers business while developing newer opportunities in chocolates, confectionery and cakes.

From a Regional Biscuit Business to a National Brand

Dukes’ journey began with a focused regional strategy before expanding rapidly into a national business. The brand was launched in 1996, a year after Ravi Foods entered the biscuit market, and achieved pan-India presence by 1997. Its subsequent entry into wafers, chocolates and confectionery helped broaden its consumer proposition beyond its original category. The evolution reflects a strategy of building on established consumer familiarity while creating new occasions for consumption. The launch of Waffy in 1999 was an important step in extending the business into wafers, followed by investments in chocolates and confectionery. More recently, the cake line and centre-filled chewing gum have widened the portfolio further.

Strengthening the Core

Biscuits, wafers and Waffy Rolls continue to form the foundation of Dukes’ business, supported by established consumer recognition and distribution. Chocolates and confectionery are important growth drivers, with cakes representing another opportunity to extend the brand’s presence across everyday snacking and indulgence. According to Srinivas Agarwal, Assistant Vice President & Operations Head, Dukes, the focus is on strengthening the established categories while scaling emerging opportunities. 

The portfolio spans sandwich, plain, coated and centre-filled biscuits, cookies, savoury products and crackers. Its wafer range includes traditional wafers and wafer rolls, while chocolates cover multiple formats and product propositions. Confectionery includes eclairs, chewing gum and other sugar-based products, alongside the Good Bake cake range.

Pricing, Manufacturing and Distribution

Operating in the mass-market segment requires balancing affordability with cost management, particularly as raw material prices fluctuate. Dukes approaches this through price-pack architecture, pack-size adjustments and operational efficiencies, aiming to protect consumer value while maintaining competitiveness. “Price pack architecture, pack sizes and operational efficiencies help us stay competitive while managing cost pressures,” says Agarwal.

Manufacturing scale and process efficiencies are central to this strategy. RFPL operates 17 manufacturing facilities, supporting production across its categories and helping the company manage productivity, product availability and market reach. Its distribution network is another important component, connecting the brand with established and emerging markets.

The company has a strong presence in southern and northern India, while its export business contributes significantly to overall operations. With a presence in more than 120 countries, Dukes has developed an international business that extends its reach beyond the domestic market.

Channel Strategy and Changing Consumer Expectations

Modern Trade and CSD-CPC remain Dukes’ strongest sales channels, supported by regular footfall and established buyer bases. However, the company is also strengthening General Trade and e-commerce to capture additional demand and improve market penetration. The channel strategy is accompanied by a focus on innovation that retains the familiarity consumers associate with established mass-market brands. Rather than changing the core proposition, Dukes explores new flavours, formats and pack sizes to introduce variety while keeping products accessible and relevant.

Agarwal describes this balance as bringing “newness without losing familiarity.” It is particularly relevant in categories where consumers are attentive to price, established tastes and the perceived value of everyday purchases.

Selective Expansion and the Next Growth Phase

Dukes’ expansion strategy combines deeper penetration in existing categories with selective entry into adjacent segments. The immediate priorities are to strengthen the core portfolio, accelerate cross-category innovation and expand its reach in urban and town markets. Alongside wider distribution, the company is looking to build stronger consumer connections and grow across categories, channels and geographies.

For a business with a three-decade history, the next phase is therefore less about moving away from its established strengths and more about extending them. Biscuits and wafers remain the foundation, while chocolates, confectionery and cakes offer opportunities to diversify consumption occasions. With manufacturing capacity, domestic distribution and exports already established as important parts of its business, Dukes’ challenge will be to translate these capabilities into sustained growth while retaining the affordability and familiarity that have shaped its journey. 

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Ashwani Arora, Managing Director & CEO, LT Foods, said, “We delivered a strong performance in the first half of FY’27, reflecting the strength of our brands, the resilience of our diversified global business and disciplined execution across markets. For H1 FY’27, our consolidated revenue grew 22% year-on-year to Rs 6,414 crores (Normalised Growth 18% including Golden Star^®), EBITDA increased 17% to Rs 721 crores, and PAT grew 9% to Rs 364 crores. This performance reflects our continued focus on building strong consumer-focussed brands, driving premiumisation and innovation, and strengthening operational efficiencies across the business.”

The Standalone Revenue of LT Foods stood at Rs 2,417 crore, growing by 14.1% YOY for H1 FY’27. EBITDA stood at Rs 223 crore, up by 33.5% and PAT is Rs 134 crore, up by 23.9%.

Basmati & Other Specialty Rice reported a growth of 27% year-on-year (Normalised Growth 22% including Golden Star^®). The Organic Food & Ingredients, which is currently undergoing a strategic remodelling, reported revenue of Rs 520 crores. The Ready-to-Eat (RTE), Ready-to-Cook (RTC) and Ready-to-Heat (RTH) segment delivered 8% growth with revenue at Rs 102 crores. 

In Q2 FY’27, consolidated revenue stood at Rs 3,253 crores, growing 17% year-on-year and 3% sequentially. EBITDA stood at Rs 358 crores, up 13% year-on-year, while PAT increased by 10% year-on-year to Rs 180 crores.

During the quarter, LT Foods further strengthened its portfolio across multiple consumer segments with the launch of DAAWAT^® Delight, DAAWAT^® Rozana Platinum and strengthened its Biryani portfolio with new format offerings like DAAWAT^® Biryani Masala Paste.

The brand has also significantly expanded its distribution footprint, strengthening product availability and consumer access across markets. It continues to invest in increasing feet-on-street and direct distribution capabilities, resulting in better assortment placement and wider product availability. Alongside these commercial initiatives, it continues to invest aggressively in digitising our supply chain and sales ecosystem. These investments are helping us improve forecasting, strengthen frontline execution and ensure superior on-shelf availability across channels while driving efficiency.

Arora added, “As we enter the second half of FY’27, we remain confident in the strength of our brands, our diversified global footprint and the long-term opportunities before us. Our ambition remains to build LT Foods into a stronger, future-ready global food FMCG company, delivering sustainable, profitable growth and creating enduring value for our consumers and all our stakeholders.”

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The snack aisle is having a rethink. As snacking moves from an occasional indulgence to an everyday eating occasion, consumers are becoming more conscious of what goes into the foods they reach for between meals. The growing interest in protein, familiar ingredients, lower sugar and cleaner labels is giving rise to a new generation of snacks that aim to deliver on both nutrition and taste. For the category, this shift is opening up a larger conversation around what a ‘better’ snack can look like without taking the pleasure out of snacking.

Yodley is stepping into this space with a proposition built around making healthier choices easier to reach for. Founded in 2025, the brand is navigating a category where consumers are increasingly unwilling to choose between indulgence and nutrition.

From product development to understanding evolving taste preferences, Yodley’s journey reflects the larger changes underway in India’s snacking market.

Rishi Singh, Founder, Yodley, shares that in one year, Yodley has expanded to more than 500 retail outlets across modern trade and general trade. Its products are also available on leading online platforms such as Blinkit, Amazon and other quick-commerce channels.

“One of our biggest learnings has been staying very close to the consumer. We have participated in more than 300+ activations and consumer events, where we interact with different types of consumers and understand their preferences. We then build our products around these consumer insights. With this incredible journey, we are focused on learning and executing more as quickly as possible,” he says.

Making Health the Default

For newer brands, health is creating an opportunity to compete not just on novelty, but on the quality, relevance and value they bring to the everyday snacking occasion.

Singh believes products made without maida and palm oil, and with good-quality ingredients, should become the norm rather than being positioned as specialised alternatives.

The change is being accompanied by a more informed consumer who is harder to win over with packaging or surface-level claims. “In the world of social media, nobody is unaware of what is happening,” he says. With consumers having greater access to information, he believes brands need to demonstrate a clear reason for consumers to choose them and, importantly, return to them.

He adds that repeat purchase is particularly important in snacking and FMCG, where sustained demand depends on delivering a product that consumers genuinely want to buy again.

Singh also sees room for new-age brands that can identify gaps in the market and build products around them. Consumers are looking for differentiated value propositions that they cannot easily find in the market. While consumers may pay a slight premium for better-quality snacks, he notes the broader shift towards ingredient-conscious consumption is making healthier choices less of a niche proposition and more of an expected standard.

Fibre Finds its Moment

As protein continues to dominate conversations around functional snacking, Singh sees another nutritional need gaining relevance: fibre. He believes the category has become heavily focused on protein over the past three to five years, leaving room for brands to build around gut health and fibre-led propositions. “The white space I see in snacking is fibre,” he said. “People are increasingly talking about gut problems, so there is a significant opportunity for snacks that are high in fibre.”

While protein has become a familiar part of the snacking conversation, Singh believes fibre remains comparatively underserved. “Protein has received significant attention over the last few years, but I believe fibre and gut health could become the next important conversation in snacking” he said, adding that brands that can bring fibre into convenient, appealing snack formats could find significant opportunity.

Beyond ingredients, Singh believes the next phase of snacking will be shaped by how effectively brands balance product innovation with price and packaging. He points to Yodley’s own experience of launching a product at ₹200. While consumers responded positively to the product, the price proved to be a barrier for a relatively new brand.

“Consumers liked the product, but they were not willing to pay ₹200 for a new-age or relatively unknown brand,” Singh said. The brand subsequently introduced ₹50 pouches as trial packs, allowing consumers to experience the product at a lower entry price before moving to larger or family packs.

For Singh, the lesson extends beyond pack size. “Price, product and packaging need to work together in a way that makes the product easy for consumers to trust and afford,” he said. As the snacking shelf becomes more crowded, making products accessible enough to encourage trial could be as important as the innovation inside the pack.

Beyond The Shelf

As the Indian snacking market becomes more competitive, Singh believes long-term success will depend on more than product innovation alone. While new-age brands continue to experiment with ingredients, formats and health-led propositions, building a strong distribution network will remain critical to turning products into household brands. “In FMCG, distribution is the key. You can make a very good product and innovate on the product side, but if your distribution network and supply chain are weak, how will consumers discover the product?” He also adds that innovation remains the starting point, but scale can only come through sustained investments in supply chain and market reach over time.

For Yodley, the ambition is to take its products beyond niche consumption and make them accessible to a wider audience. The brand wants to take its products to every Indian household and potentially to the rest of the world.

Alongside strengthening distribution, the company is also expanding its product portfolio. Yodley has already launched eight SKUs across its snacking range and is exploring different approaches across pricing, packaging and product propositions to widen consumer appeal. The next area of focus for the brand could be sugar-free sweets, a category Singh sees as closely aligned with India’s changing consumption habits.

He believes there is room for products that preserve the role of sweets in Indian festivities while offering consumers alternatives with lower sugar content. “We do not want to take that celebration away from Indian households. We want to offer a better combination that allows consumers to celebrate while having a more guilt-free option,” concludes Singh. 

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Building a dairy business in 1992 meant solving two problems at once: securing a reliable supply of milk from farmers and earning the trust of consumers who depended on its freshness every day. Heritage Foods was set up on June 5 that year with this dual challenge at the centre of its business model. The ambition was not simply to sell dairy products, but to create an organised system connecting farmers, processing infrastructure and household consumption.

That meant building the business from the ground up: establishing village-level procurement, investing in chilling and processing, and developing a consumer brand in parallel. Over three decades later, the company’s operations span 17 states, connecting more than 3,00,000 dairy farmers across 3,000-plus villages with a consumer base of over 10 million. Its scale has grown, but the founding equation—farmer livelihoods, dependable dairy and disciplined growth—continues to shape its strategy.

Building the Value Chain, Link by Link

The early years presented a complex operational challenge: Heritage had to develop its procurement ecosystem, infrastructure and consumer market simultaneously. It needed to establish trust with farmers, set up village-level collection points, invest in chilling and processing facilities, and build demand for its products. In dairy, the reliability of the consumer proposition depends on every stage of the chain, leaving little room for disconnected expansion.

The company describes its growth as largely organic; built village by village, farmer by farmer and market by market. Its approach was also a shift in how dairy could be organised: a professionally managed private enterprise could create value for farmers, consumers and shareholders while building a scalable operation.

Capital efficiency and asset productivity were important considerations as the business grew. Rather than pursuing expansion at any cost, Heritage says it prioritised balance-sheet strength and sustainable growth, a discipline it continues to apply to its investments and operating decisions.

The Infrastructure Behind Farm to Home

Heritage’s operating model depends on an integrated cold chain connecting milk procurement, chilling, processing and distribution. The company’s procurement network is supported by on-ground representatives and infrastructure designed to preserve milk quality and move it efficiently into processing.

Procurement and Processing Network

This infrastructure supports a cross-regional sourcing and distribution network. Heritage reports operations across 17 states, with direct links to more than 300,000 dairy farmers across over 3,000 villages. Its consumer-facing network includes more than 850 Heritage Parlours and 146 Heritage Happiness Points, alongside its broader distribution channels.

The combination of procurement reach, chilling capacity and processing infrastructure gives the company a platform to serve daily dairy requirements while extending its presence into newer product segments. The company’s challenge is to maintain consistency and freshness across a wide operating footprint as it broadens the range of products moving through the network.

Trust as a Business Principle

Heritage summarises its guiding philosophy in three principles: delight the consumer, empower the farmer and maintain financial discipline. The company’s leadership describes these as interconnected responsibilities: consumers depend on the quality of products brought into their homes, farmers depend on reliable procurement and payments, and shareholders expect capital to be managed prudently.

The company says this philosophy was tested during a recent period of constrained milk availability and rising procurement costs. Supporting its farmer ecosystem through that period created short-term pressure on profitability, but Heritage maintains that sustaining long-term relationships and protecting product quality take precedence over immediate financial considerations.

In dairy, where consumers purchase frequently and product trust is built through everyday experience, quality remains a non-negotiable part of the proposition. Heritage’s stated approach is to protect that confidence through market volatility rather than compromise it for short-term gains.

A Portfolio Moving Beyond Milk

Milk remains Heritage’s largest category, reflecting its role as a frequent household purchase and the foundation of the company’s relationship with consumers. But its portfolio strategy increasingly extends to differentiated dairy products and specialised brand platforms that address distinct nutritional, lifestyle and indulgence occasions.

The Heritage master brand anchors the core portfolio, including milk, curd, paneer, ghee, butter and buttermilk. Alongside these staples, the company has developed specialised platforms: Livo for nutrition-led and mindful snacking, Nourish+ for high-protein dairy, Sampurna for A2 dairy, Alpenvie for ice cream and GETAWAY for indulgence with better-for-you attributes, including high protein and zero added sugar.

Partnerships that Strengthen Capabilities

Heritage’s development has involved building capabilities across procurement, manufacturing, quality, innovation, marketing and distribution. The company points to partnerships with global technology providers such as Tetra Pak, GEA and SIG as important to strengthening its processing, packaging, automation and food-safety capabilities.

These relationships have supported investments in manufacturing efficiency and product quality, while helping the company bring differentiated products to market. Partnerships across modern trade and quick commerce have also helped Heritage respond to changing shopping behaviour, improve product discovery and build visibility for newer categories, including high-protein, probiotic and better-for-you dairy.

GETAWAY represents another dimension of this strategy. The company describes the brand as a way to engage younger consumers seeking high-protein, low-sugar and mindful indulgence options, complementing Heritage’s existing strengths in manufacturing, quality and distribution.

For Heritage, the value of a partnership is measured not only by immediate revenue, but also by whether it strengthens business capabilities, deepens consumer understanding and supports long-term growth.

Shamirpet: Scaling the Ice Cream Ambition

Heritage Foods’ greenfield ice cream plant at Shamirpet, near Hyderabad, marks an important step in scaling its presence in the ice cream and frozen desserts market. The facility has been designed with sufficient capacity to support the company’s ambition of building a ₹500–600 crore ice cream business over the next several years, while its advanced manufacturing technology provides flexibility for product innovation alongside consistent quality and manufacturing standards.

The facility will support Heritage’s portfolio across different consumption occasions, with Alpenvie addressing mainstream indulgence and GETAWAY targeting the emerging demand for high-protein and low-sugar options. Beyond adding manufacturing capacity, the investment strengthens the company’s ability to expand its ice cream distribution, respond to regional consumer preferences and leverage its existing cold-chain and market infrastructure.

The Shamirpet investment is part of a wider value-added dairy strategy, with the segment already contributing more than 40% of the company’s revenues and growing faster than the overall business. With investments of more than ₹200 crore annually, the company is directing capital towards value-added processing, cold-chain infrastructure, manufacturing technology and future product innovation.

Edited Excerpts:

With changing consumer preferences creating opportunities in value-added dairy and packaged foods, how is Heritage Foods accelerating its transformation into a consumer-centric food company?

Milk remains at the heart of Heritage Foods and continues to be the foundation of its relationship with consumers. What is evolving is how consumers consume dairy and the specific benefits they seek from it. Rising demand for protein, probiotics, gut health, convenience and mindful indulgence is creating new opportunities within the category. Heritage is responding by taking a more consumer-centric approach, identifying changing needs, consumption occasions and barriers to adoption, and developing differentiated propositions around clear benefit platforms. The company’s transformation is therefore not about moving beyond milk, but about expanding dairy’s relevance across more occasions and needs. By thinking increasingly like a consumer products company, Heritage aims to evolve into a consumer-centric dairy nutrition business with a larger role in consumers’ daily lives. 

Quick-commerce is reshaping the way consumers purchase food and dairy products. How is Heritage Foods adapting its distribution and product strategies to capitalise on this fast-growing channel?

Quick-commerce is moving beyond being a new sales channel to reshape how consumers buy dairy and how companies manage supply chains. Traditional dairy systems were built around planned replenishment, larger loads and inventory efficiency; quick commerce places greater emphasis on immediate availability, making stock-outs a direct loss of sales. It is also creating new consumption occasions, from post-workout protein drinks and probiotic buttermilk to paneer for dinner or ice cream as an impulse purchase. At the same time, the channel is emerging as a discovery platform, helping products such as high-protein paneer, probiotic curd, low-sugar ice cream and nutrition-led offerings reach relevant consumers faster. For Heritage, this calls for sharper assortment planning, faster replenishment and data-led supply chains that respond to local consumption patterns. The ability to combine innovation with supply-chain agility is increasingly becoming central to the consumer experience.

As consumers increasingly seek quality, convenience, and health-focused products, what role does premiumisation play in Heritage Foods’ strategy for expanding its dairy portfolio?

Consumers are willing to pay more only when they experience a meaningful benefit—whether that comes through better nutrition, higher protein, lower sugar, superior ingredients, greater convenience, richer taste or a better overall consumption experience. The premium is therefore a consequence of value creation, not the starting point.

At Heritage, premiumisation is about creating products that consumers believe are worth paying more for because they deliver a superior experience. Ultimately, sustainable premiumisation is built on consumer trust and consumer delight.

The growing contribution of yogurt, paneer, and other value-added products reflects changing consumer preferences. How is Heritage Foods capitalising on this opportunity to strengthen its competitive position?

The growth of value-added dairy is closely linked to the broader shift we discussed earlier—the migration from homemade and unbranded consumption towards trusted branded solutions.

However, we believe the future opportunity extends beyond simply participating in value-added categories. Over time, categories themselves can become commoditised. The real opportunity lies in building brands that address clearly defined consumer needs and occasions.

This is why we have invested in platforms such as Livo, which focuses on mindful snacking and nutrition; Nourish+, which addresses the growing demand for high-protein products; Sampurna, which caters to consumers seeking A2 dairy solutions; and GETAWAY, which combines indulgence with better-for-you benefits.

As competition for milk procurement intensifies and input costs remain elevated, what measures are being taken to strengthen the sourcing network and protect profitability?

At Heritage, milk procurement begins with farmer prosperity. On any given day, more than 1.5 lakh farmers pour milk into our network. Our objective is not merely to secure milk supply; it is to help these farmers build sustainable and growing dairy businesses.

We have set ourselves an ambitious goal of doubling the nominal income of our farmers over a five-year period. Achieving this requires annual income growth of roughly 14–15%. Importantly, milk price increases alone cannot deliver that outcome. A significant portion of the improvement must come from higher productivity at the farm level.

This is why we invest extensively in animal induction programmes, artificial insemination, increasing adoption of sex-sorted semen, breed improvement initiatives, animal health services and nutrition advisory programmes. We work closely with farmers to improve feeding practices, balanced rationing and productivity per animal.

These interventions help farmers produce more milk efficiently while improving the quality and consistency of supply. In turn, stronger farmer ecosystems create stronger sourcing networks.

What is the current addressable market for Heritage Foods’ value-added dairy  and how will it expand over the next decade across geographies?

The opportunity is substantial because many of the categories we participate in remain under-penetrated from an organised branded perspective. As consumers increasingly prioritise convenience, consistency, hygiene, nutrition and trusted brands, we expect this migration towards organised branded products to continue. At the same time, newer segments such as protein-rich dairy products, probiotics, yogurt, flavoured milk, premium beverages and better-for-you indulgence categories are creating entirely new growth opportunities.

The next decade of Indian dairy growth is unlikely to be driven solely by higher milk consumption. It will increasingly be driven by creating more value from every litre of milk through nutrition, convenience, premiumisation and innovation. We also expect the opportunity to expand geographically. 

What key developments or innovations are driving the company’s leadership position in the market? 

Our competitive advantage comes from the combination of three factors: superior capabilities, a unique operating structure and a strong sense of purpose.

• Superior capabilities: Heritage has developed expertise across consumer understanding, R&D, product innovation, manufacturing, procurement and route-to-market execution. By identifying evolving consumer needs and emerging trends, the company translates insights into differentiated products and brands.
  
• Unique operating structure: Its federated manufacturing network brings operations closer to farmers and consumers. Shorter farm-to-consumer distances help preserve freshness, maintain quality and address local market needs. The combination of small-batch processing and modern manufacturing technologies further strengthens this model.
  
• Strong sense of purpose: Heritage’s mission of delighting every household with fresh and healthy products while empowering farmers guides its decisions on quality, innovation, customer relationships and long-term value creation. Together, these three pillars form a competitive advantage that is difficult to replicate.

What are the challenges Heritage Foods is facing from the plant-based dairy segment that is rapidly evolving in India, and does it pose a structural threat or remain niche?

Plant-based alternatives remain a relatively small part of India’s food landscape, while dairy continues to play a central role in the country’s nutrition, cuisine and everyday consumption. However, consumers are becoming more informed and experimental, with some exploring plant-based options for lifestyle, sustainability or dietary reasons. Heritage views this as an evolution of consumer choice rather than a direct threat to dairy. The larger opportunity, it believes, remains within dairy itself, particularly as consumers seek higher protein, probiotics, gut-health benefits, lower sugar and greater convenience. The company will continue to track these shifts, while evaluating opportunities based on genuine consumer needs and its ability to create differentiated value, rather than entering categories simply because they represent emerging trends.

How is Heritage Foods tapping into the health and wellness segment that plays a significant role in the growth of categories like Greek yogurt, whey protein, and pro biotic drinks among its consumers?

Health and wellness is no longer a niche trend. It is increasingly becoming a mainstream consumer behaviour. Today’s consumers are reading labels more carefully and actively seeking products that offer functional benefits such as protein, digestive health, immunity support and lower sugar.

Our approach has been to deliver these benefits through formats that consumers already know, trust and enjoy. Products such as Nourish+ High Protein Paneer, Livo High Protein Yogurts, our probiotic offerings and other nutrition-led innovations are examples of this strategy in action.

Importantly, we do not believe consumers want to choose between nutrition and enjoyment. The most successful products are those that combine both. Take Nourish+ high-protein paneer for example. While the 60g Protein claim may encourage trial, but it’s the uncompromising taste and affordability that ultimately drive repeat consumption.

We see considerable opportunity in protein-rich dairy, probiotics, fermented products and other functional nutrition segments. Given dairy’s natural nutritional credentials, we believe it is uniquely positioned to play an increasingly important role in India’s health and wellness journey.

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The New York Loaded Waffles range features brownie, cheesecake and chocolate chip ingredients loaded in the waffle bases, complemented by rich spreads, sauces and crunchy toppings.

The lineup features four distinct flavour combinations. The Blueberry ’N White Chocolate Waffle brings together velvety white chocolate spread, blueberry sauce and French biscuit flakes, with the option of pairing it with Blueberry Cheesecake Gelato.

The Brownie ’N Nutella Choco Chip Waffle combines a brownie-loaded base with creamy Nutella and chocolate chips, with an ice cream pairing featuring Chocolate C Roasted Hazelnut Gelato.

The Cheesecake G Lotus Biscoff Crumble Waffle combines a cheesecake-loaded base with Lotus Biscoff spread and crunchy crumble, with the option of Biscoff Ice Cream. Rounding off the range, the Chocolate Overload Waffle features a chocolate chip-loaded base with gooey milk chocolate spread and chocolate chips, with an ice cream pairing featuring Bavarian Chocolate Ice Cream.

Mohit Khattar, CEO, Graviss Foods Pvt. Ltd. (Baskin Robbins India), said, “At Baskin Robbins India, innovation is central to how we continue to delight consumers. The addition of New York Loaded Waffle sandwiches allows us to bring a fresh perspective to a familiar favourite. Our New York Loaded Waffles combine American flair and heritage with our understanding of Indian palates. They offer distinctive ways for consumers to enjoy their sweet treats and snacks. This launch reflects our continued focus on expanding our portfolio with exciting offerings that blend international taste, texture and choice.”

The New York Loaded Waffles will be available across 1,150+ Baskin Robbins parlours in 320+ cities, with prices starting at Rs 150 + GST.

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Livo has established a presence in India’s yogurt market. Its integration with Heritage Foods’ wider dairy platform is intended to support coordinated brand development and closer alignment with the Company’s consumer and distribution capabilities.

Value-added products are becoming an increasingly important part of Heritage Foods’ portfolio. Excluding ghee and butter, VAP contribution to dairy revenue reached 35.4% in Q2 FY27 and 39.6% in H1 FY27, compared with 31.3% and 33.7%, respectively, in the corresponding periods last year.

The proposed amalgamation is intended to integrate the businesses and financial resources more effectively, enable efficient utilisation and management of cash flows, and simplify the Group structure by eliminating an additional legal entity and reducing duplicative statutory, regulatory and administrative requirements.

The consolidation is also intended to support unified management, faster decision-making and synergies through optimisation of resources, production capabilities and business processes, alongside rationalisation of administrative and operational costs.

Commenting on the Results, Brahmani Nara, Executive Director, Heritage Foods, said, “Our focus remains on building a stronger, more integrated and future-ready dairy business. The proposed amalgamation of Heritage Novandie Foods is an important step in strengthening our value-added dairy platform, while simplifying the overall structure and enabling greater alignment across the business. As we continue to scale differentiated and branded dairy products, we believe this integration will further strengthen our platform for sustainable growth and enhance operational efficiency over the long term.”

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I watched traditional supply chains fracture under a shifting climate. Broad-spectrum chemical rescue packages failed to stop resistant pathogens. Maximum residue limit (MRL) rejections at European and North American ports multiplied into millions of dollars in losses. For retail buyers and kitchen tables alike, spice shelves suffered from erratic out-of-stocks and wild price swings.

We realised a hard truth: we had to stop guessing. We had to treat flavour chemistry as data.

Over the past decade, that realisation sparked a quiet, structural agricultural revolution across India, Vietnam, and East Africa. We stopped viewing organic spice cultivation as a low-yield compromise and engineered it into a high-science discipline. Today, the ancient art of the masala stands fortified by a closed-loop, cyber-physical ecosystem.

The Decade in Review: Climate Shocks and Agronomic Realities (2016–2026)

Abiotic stress no longer acts as an isolated seasonal anomaly; it defines our baseline growing environment.

• Temperature & Spike Shedding: Rising ambient thresholds triggered physiological shock, causing severe spike shedding in black pepper and flower abortion in small cardamom during dry pre-monsoon windows.
• Humidity-Driven Disease Dynamics: Extended high-humidity spells and unseasonal downpours supercharged powdery mildew and aphid colonisation in seed spices (cumin, coriander, fenugreek).
• Thermal Range Shifts: Warming microclimates pushed fungal pathogens and boring insects into higher-altitude or traditionally temperate plantation zones, driving up crop protection losses.
• Resilience Engineering: Growers abandoned reactive defence for landscape-level mitigation—redesigning shade-tree canopies in pepper estates, adopting organic mulching, and introducing drought-tolerant ideotypes through molecular breeding.

Growth Dynamics: Moving Beyond Raw Bulk Exports

Global demand decoupled from traditional culinary volumes over the last ten years, pivoting rapidly toward functional wellness, clean-label preservation, and verifiable provenance.

• Value-Added Diversification: Producing regions transitioned from raw shipping containers to steam-sterilised, cryo-ground, oleoresin, and standardised extract segments, capturing higher farm-gate margins.
• The Health & Immunity Dividend: Post-pandemic consumer behaviour cemented anti-inflammatory and antioxidant-rich botanicals—curcuminoids in turmeric and high-piperine black pepper—as core nutraceutical ingredients.
• Compliance-at-Source: Stringent MRL enforcement in importing economies made pre-shipment chemical purity a non-negotiable prerequisite for market access.

The Organic Frontier: Purity Meets Precision

The historic trade-off between chemical-free organic farming and commercial yield stability has officially closed.

• Closed-Nutrient & Microbial Systems: Replacing synthetic nitrogen with customised, site-specific consortia of Trichoderma, Pseudomonas, and mycorrhizal bio-fertilisers stabilised baseline yields in intensive turmeric and ginger.
• The Drift-Zero Challenge: Strict zero-synthetic thresholds left no room for chemical drift from neighbouring farms. Geospatial buffer mapping and community-cluster organic conversions now safeguard export status.
• AI Optical Sorting: Hyperspectral sorting lines at origin processing gates detect internal mould, aflatoxins, and foreign organic matter in milliseconds, clearing strict organic protocols without chemical intervention.
• Regenerative Intercropping: Integrating cover crops and nitrogen-fixing shade trees (Erythrina and silver oak) suppresses weeds while locking in root-zone moisture during severe heatwaves.

Cyber-Physical IPM: From Sticky Traps to Drone Fleets

Modern Integrated Pest Management (IPM) in spice cultivation replaces blanket chemical spraying with closed-loop, cyber-physical precision. Multispectral drone imagery and IoT sensors predict pest and fungal outbreaks early with 90% machine learning accuracy, while mobile AI vision models diagnose leaf and stem anomalies instantly. Variable-rate aerial micro-spraying reduces synthetic and bio-pesticide volume by up to 30%. Biological and cultural controls—such as semiochemical disruption and conserved natural enemy corridors—sustainably suppress infestations below economic damage thresholds. Backed by public programs like India’s One PACS One Drone initiative, farmer cooperatives achieve strict residue-zero export compliance for black pepper, cardamom, and cumin.

The Retail Advantage: Inventory Insurance on the Shelf

For grocery category managers and private-label buyers, farm-level intelligence translates directly into store-level velocity.

• Predictive Yield Modelling: Telemetry-driven harvest forecasts 3 to 6 months in advance replace spot-market gambling with reliable volume commitments.
• Cryo-Milling Potency: Grinding at sub-zero temperatures locks in volatile essential oils, doubling aroma and colour retention on retail racks and cutting markdown losses.
• Blockchain MRL Passports: Scannable QR codes link jars back to specific FPO blocks with immutable safety audits, eliminating border holds and recall risks.

The 5-Year Outlook (2026–2031): What’s Next?

1. Generative Agronomy Assistants: Localised, voice-enabled vernacular AI agents will deliver daily hyper-local advisories (spray windows, nutrient tweaks) straight to smallholder feature phones.
2. Genomic & Gene-Edited Resilience: CRISPR-derived fungal-resistant black pepper and heat-tolerant small cardamom will graduate from trials into commercial soil.
3. Autonomous In-Field Robotics: Ground-crawling solar rovers equipped with laser weeders and micro-dose bio-pesticide jets will complement aerial drone fleets.
4. Carbon-Indexed Dual Credits: Remote-sensing soil organic carbon (SOC) audits will let growers stack regenerative carbon credits alongside organic price premiums.
5. ERP-to-IoT Inventory Sync: Retail warehouse software will ingest live farm telemetry to automate replenishment triggers ahead of regional weather shifts.

A jar of cumin or turmeric on a supermarket shelf is no longer a passive grocery commodity. It is a verified ledger of climate adaptation and digital precision. When we back the smallholder and the soil with the right technology, the ancient art of the masala becomes an unshakeable modern science.

The spice shelf of tomorrow is written in data, rooted in regenerative soil, and verified by blockchain. Over the past decade, we proved that protecting our most sensitive botanicals does not mean choosing between purity and yield. By uniting cyber-physical IPM with localised microbial systems and cryo-milling, we insulated smallholders from climate chaos and delivered zero-defect transparency to global markets. As generative AI assistants and gene-edited resilience enter commercial fields by 2031, every spice jar becomes a testament to human ingenuity. When we treat flavour chemistry with scientific rigour, the ancient art of the masala endures.

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Backed by RCPL’s distribution infrastructure, retail scale and consumer insights, Joyland is available in Tamil Nadu with immediate effect. The launch reflects the company’s long-term commitment to the ready-to-drink dairy market, with plans to introduce additional flavours and expand into multiple dairy beverage categories. Following its launch in Tamil Nadu, Joyland will be progressively rolled out across India.

T Krishnakumar, Director, Reliance Consumer Products Limited, said, “Our entry into the ready-to-drink dairy market is a significant step in extending RCPL’s portfolio and widening the choices we offer consumers. With Joyland, we are bringing together authentic dairy ingredients,  quality and affordability to make world-class products accessible to more households. Tamil Nadu  marks the beginning of this journey, as we build Joyland into a broader dairy beverages portfolio and progressively expand its reach across India.”

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The brand aims to build on Delhi’s enduring culture of mithai consumption, catering to occasions ranging from everyday indulgences and family gatherings to festivals, weddings and corporate gifting. Its offering draws on familiar rituals, whether buying a single piece to satisfy an after-dinner craving, bringing home a box to share with family or choosing sweets to mark a special occasion.

The brand’s concept draws inspiration from the everyday role of mithai in Delhi’s food culture, where sweets are bought for personal consumption, shared at home and exchanged during milestones and celebrations. Its focus on modern presentation and curated gifting seeks to extend these established consumption occasions while keeping the familiarity of traditional Indian sweets at the centre of the offering.

Gaurav Sircar, Co-Founder, Dilli Mithai Co. said, “Mithai has always been deeply connected to home, family and celebration. With Dilli Mithai Co., we wanted to take those familiar flavours and give them a little more personality, without losing what makes them special. Our vision is to create a brand that can become part of everyday moments as much as celebrations. We want Dilli Mithai Co. to feel like the familiar mithai shop you can walk into regularly, contemporary in expression, but approachable, dependable and relevant to every Delhi home.”

“For us, the culinary approach has always been about finding the balance between familiarity and discovery. We work with flavours and formats that people recognise, but introduce something unexpected through texture, flavour or presentation. The idea is not to change the soul of Indian mithai, but to give it a new expression that can appeal to both traditionalists and a younger, contemporary audience,” said Chef Neelam Saini Sircar, Co-Founder, Dilli Mithai Co.

The menu at Dilli Mithai Co. brings together traditional Indian mithai with contemporary flavours and formats, offering a diverse selection that extends beyond sweets to include savouries and namkeen, confectionery and chocolates, as well as dried fruits and nuts. The assortment is designed to cater to a variety of consumer preferences and occasions, from everyday indulgences and teatime snacking to festive celebrations, family gatherings and gifting.

Among the highlights are Salted Caramel Aata Ladoo, which brings a contemporary twist to a familiar favourite; Kaju Katli Emoji, a playful take on the iconic Indian mithai; and Coffee Doda Fudge, which offers a contemporary interpretation of a traditional sweet. The collection also features creations such as Cinnamon Khaja, Thandai Biskoot, Vanberry, Gulkand Malai, Pista Laung and Pista Kunafa Ghevar, alongside classics including Motichoor Ladoo. Dilli Mithai Co. seeks to appeal to both traditional mithai enthusiasts and consumers looking for something new.

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As per a Reuters article, the company is expected to begin preparations for the IPO in mid-2027, according to Haresh Karamchandani, CEO, HyFun Foods. The issue will largely comprise fresh shares and will be used to fund capacity expansion and strengthen the company’s focus on the domestic market.

Frozen foods such as French fries, pizzas and dumplings are gaining popularity in India as consumers increasingly look for convenient food options, supported by the rapid growth of quick commerce.

Indian households have traditionally preferred freshly prepared meals over ready-to-eat and frozen products. However, Karamchandani said the industry is now approaching a shift towards frozen food. “The industry is at the cusp of a shift from fresh to frozen,” he said.

HyFun currently exports to more than 40 countries, with international markets accounting for around three-fourths of its revenue. Karamchandani expects the share of exports to decline to about half of the company’s revenue over the next five years as domestic demand increases.

India’s food services industry is expected to grow to $150 billion by the end of the decade from around $90 billion currently, supported by the expansion of restaurant chains, according to Redseer Strategy Consultants. HyFun expects its revenue to more than double to nearly Rs 3,500 crore by fiscal 2028. The growth is expected to be driven by capacity expansion, increased business from regional restaurant chains and hotels, and rising retail demand.

Global restaurant chains currently account for around 40% of HyFun’s domestic revenue. The company expects this share to decline to about 30% over the next two years as it expands its presence among local customers.

HyFun’s customers in India include coffee chain Blue Tokai, PVR Cinemas and Wow Chicken. The company’s planned IPO comes as India’s frozen food market gains momentum, with changing consumption habits, expanding food-service businesses and the growth of quick-commerce platforms supporting demand.

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