Yoplait to Launch Lactose-Free Yogurt in Late January

Hey, everybody. We've been noticed!

Kendall J. Powell - isn't that the perfect corporate executive name? - is the CEO of food product behemoth General Mills, the $15 billion giant that owns practically every other brand you see in a supermarket. One of their more than 100 brands is Yoplait, which General Mills bought out last May. And Ken - yes, he's called Ken, just like a normal person - has big plans for the yogurt. Plans that include us.

CEOs have to prime investors of their plans and expected earnings on a regular basis because this affects the predictions of their stock prices. So they do quarterly conferences in which they lure in the suckers with glittery promises of good times ahead. The investment site SeekingAlpha.com put up a transcript of their General Mills Second Quarter F '12 Earnings Results Conference Call.

And here's the part that concerns us:

We've got some good innovation coming on Yoplait in the second half. We'll introduce Greek yogurt and granola parfaits and new flavors of our Greek yogurt in multipack formats. We're also launching a new line of lactose-free Yoplait yogurt. Studies show that around 15% of U.S. consumers are lactose intolerant, and the percentage is higher among the growing multicultural populations. Dairy products that provide a lactose-free benefit are growing at a double-digit rate, so our retail customers recognize the increasing importance of this trend. We think this is a good innovation for the Yoplait brand, and we'll support this new line with couponing, digital advertising and in-store sampling.

More digging found out that the lactose-free yogurt will be in stores at the end of January. You should see four flavors. Cherry is obviously one of them, since that's the picture they sent out, but I haven't found the other three. This is so new that nothing about it is available at the Yoplait website yet. Keep checking there, though. You'll sure to find coupons for these new products as they get rolled out.

Other lactose-free real milk yogurts exist now, of course. Lactaid has a line of them in four flavors, strawberry, vanilla, peach, and blueberry. Green Valley Organics has even more flavors: peach, plain, honey, blueberry, vanilla, and strawberry.

Brands go out of the lactose-free business quickly, though. The Continental lactose-free yogurt I wrote about in 2007 is no longer available. Neither is the company. If you really want lactose-free yogurt, be sure to buy it and keep it in business.