Kay’s Naturals Brand Discontinued, Shifts Business To Be A Private Label Producer

Six months after being sold to ingredient company Milk Specialties Global (MSG), Minnesota-based protein snack maker Kay’s Naturals has discontinued its branded product lines as its new owner looks to focus on expanding its extruded protein production capabilities.

Ben Kroeplin, a spokesperson for MSG, said this transition was a significant driver behind the company’s decision to acquire both Kay’s gluten-free certified processing facility and its consumer brand last August. From MSG’s perspective, the discontinuation marks a simple shift in Kay’s business model from branded products to private label lines, where MSG does the majority of its business.

Over the past two decades, Kay’s has developed a wide ranging portfolio of high-protein snacks including plant-based cookie bites, cereals, pretzels and puffs. Kroeplin noted that Kay’s entire portfolio may not seamlessly transition into private label products, but said that the extruded proteins can be easily remade into bars as well as a variety of other snack formats and their key attributes, namely high-protein and gluten-free, are in high demand among MSG’s customers.

“Ultimately, we’re a customer driven company,” he emphasized. “We’re obviously working with customers and bringing new customers on as part of this process, so we’re open to what they want within our private label manufacturing and we still have the capabilities and the flavors [of Kay’s] to continue offering those products.”

For MSG, this was an opportunity to continue adding new forms of protein to its manufacturing capabilities, and thus, expanding and modernizing its business to keep pace with new food trends. Additionally, the two companies share roots in Minnesota.

MSG started out by upcycling dairy byproducts into whey protein concentrates and isolates, often used in milk replacers, almost 80 years ago. Kroeplin said the expansion into extruded proteins is a natural evolution for MSG, which also added plant-based proteins to its production capabilities about five years ago.

“I often tell people, our ingredients are probably in your cupboard right now, you just don’t know it,” Kroeplin joked.

While an acquisition can often mean budget cuts and job loss, Kroeplin said the entire staff from Kay’s joined MSG following its sale, including both its management team and processing facility operators. MSG is actively looking to add additional team members to support its “aggressive growth” and it is currently expanding Kay’s processing facility with a new production line.

“We really want to try to get the most out of the facility as it is,” said Kroeplin. “There’s a great local workforce who were part of Kay’s and just made the seamless transition over to MSG. The plan right now is to continue looking for help, expand the facilities, continue to create jobs, add lines and keep pace with demand out there for the extruded protein products.”