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From the breakfast aisle to the $1.3bn confectionery market, Murray River Organics has now developed its first all-organic, plant-based range of Mylk Chocolate, working with design agency What Came Next and Melbourne-based RollsPack for the packaging.

Murray River Organics general manager of marketing and sales Tara Lordsmith told PKN, the brief was to keep the branding strong but “ensure we applied a design that worked for the confectionery category, which uses a lot more metallics and brighter colours”.

The final doypacks feature a gloss varnish over a metallic PET material, with a range of bold colours across the five variants in the confectionery range.

The new range is the first organics brand to enter the confectionery aisle as well as the only brand to offer a product with own-grown origins – specifically using its own organic sultanas in its Organic Mylk Chocolate Sultanas variant – according to Murray River Organics.

“Customer demand for organics isn’t limited to one category, the need for better-for-you products is holistic and we were prepared to branch out to cater to this need,” Lordsmith said.

The company also teamed up with coffee roasters St. Ali, using its organic and ethically soured coffee beans, which were used in combination with Murray River Organics’ sultanas for a bitter-sweet blend.

The rest of the range includes organic raw hazelnuts, almonds and sulphite-free organic apricots picked by the company’s specialist farming partners, all of which are dressed in organic "mylk" chocolate, which is plant-based, dairy-free, gluten-free and certified organic.

“We believe that affordable organic options belong in every aisle of our supermarkets and we’re proud to be the first in taking these innovative and progressive steps like breaking into the confectionery market with a better-for-you, better-for-the-planet range,” Murray River Organics managing director and CEO Valentina Tripp said.

“We have proud roots in organic dried vine fruit and are today Australia’s largest producer. Now the brand is branching out to lead the charge on mass adoption of organics, focusing on scale and quality to bring more organics to more shoppers in more places. Yesterday it was the breakfast aisle, today confectionery, tomorrow... you’ll have to wait and see.”

Earlier in August, Murray River Organics launched its pantry staples range, while earlier in the year it signed supermarket deals with both Coles and Woolworths.

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