Sainsburys baby food range web

Sainsbury’s new baby food range

Sainsbury’s has expanded its Little Ones babycare range into food for the first time.

The retailer today (25 April) launched 50 new lines of snacks and meals for babies and toddlers to sit alongside its longstanding lines such as wipes and nappies. The food items are available nationwide online and in store, and range from 70p to £2.

With an emphasis on savoury rather than sweet items, the NPD include organic rice, organic peach & apple purée and organic beef casserole.

The range also takes a vegetable-first approach, with vegetables in the majority of products. All savoury meal items for those seven months onwards contain at least one portion of vegetable. All products are organic up to 12 months, and to allow fortification with iron, often lacking in toddlers’ diets and which contributes to children’s normal cognitive development, products for children 12 months and over are not organic, and are fortified where appropriate.

The Little Ones food range has been developed over the last two years alongside nutritionist Fiona Wilcock, taking into account the nutritional needs of babies and toddlers, and was created to supplement home cooking. A further 25 products will be available from August.

“As a parent myself, I know how exciting it can be when you first start weaning your baby, trying new products and seeing some very funny reactions. Sainsbury’s also know how important it is for parents to trust what is going in their little ones’ mouths,” said Charlotte Judd, product developer at Sainsbury’s. “We always want to help our customers live well for less and we’ve spent over two years carefully designing the Little Ones range so that it gives parents a broad offer of products which are nutritionally sound, taste great and make feeding fun.”

Fiona Wilcock added: “The Little Ones range has been developed to progress from simple single vegetable puree pouches, and build on these in complexity and texture to support each stage of a baby’s physical and nutritional needs.

“While babies have a natural preference for sweet flavours, it’s very important they learn to eat and enjoy savoury foods. For this reason there are many more savoury foods in the Little Ones range and we have no biscuits, sweet rice cakes, biscotti or cereal bars for babies under one year.”