The 5 Secret Ingredients Behind Kellogg's Innovation Success

We asked Salvador Millan Morales one of Arbolus's senior Digital infrastructure and transformation experts about his time at Kelloggs.

Our expert’s insight into how CPG leaders are using AI and Data to unlock growth potential in a saturated market.
Salvador Millan Morales is a CPG industry veteran with over 25 years of experience in digital transformation. As Kellogg's former Global VP of IT Infrastructure, he was responsible for leading innovation initiatives across its entire IT function. Under his tenure, Kellogg's was the first CPG company to run SAP in AWS, and became a leader in leveraging digital infrastructure.

The CPG Landscape: A Market in Flux

Large Consumer Packed Goods (CPG) brands have historically been known to make safe returns, even in times of market fluctuation. Today, this is no longer the case.

No longer immune to the challenges posed by niche upcoming competitors, industry heavyweights have lost more than $17 billion worth of market share to CPG start-ups.

How Kellogg's Overcame this Challenge

In spite of this, Kellogg's successfully defended its market position by transforming the way it engages with technology. Specifically, Kellogg's tapped into the benefits of using AI and Data to re-invigorate the way they cater to their consumers' needs. What drove Kellogg's to succeed in this endeavour were the insights and leadership provided by Global VP of IT Infrastructure, Salvador Millan Morales.

"A centre of expertise, new digital capabilities and the right project management were our secret ingredients to success."

Under his direction, Kellogg's emerged as one of the standout digital players in the CPG space. Salvador sat down with us to discuss the steps he took to augment Kellogg's technology initiatives:

Step 1: Don't Be Afraid of Tackling New Technologies

"When thinking of true innovation, think. new products, new services in the market place."

"Some of the failures I've seen in CPG is when companies rush to adopt the latest technology without doing the right due diligence. Technology can bring new business models to light and is a driving force for companies to disrupt themselves before they are disrupted by others. The right test and learn approach should enable companies to fail quickly and roll out what can work very rapidly"

Step 2: Use the "Right" Data to Innovative Ways You Engage With Consumers

"If you don't have a foundation of data that has the right quality and has been graded in such a way that can be worked ... you are set up for failure."

Step 3: Become a Presence in Multiple Channels

"In the future, we're not going to talk about brick and mortar vs. online retail. It'll all be about omni-channel retailers who have that competitive edge."

Step 4: Find the Right Consolidation Partners

"We're going to see consumers being enabled by technology to determine product value. If I were a CPG company, I would want to own that technology in order to showcase our best products."

Step 5: Optimise Your Trade Promotion Platforms to Solve Consumer Needs

"When a consumer chooses a provider, they go with whoever most fully meets their needs. The provider needs to leverage digital platforms to evolve into more than just a product, They need to become an authority in their game."