Jeffrey Harmening
Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer at General Mills
When we think about innovation, we kind of think about it broadly, and it can happen in all the ways you identify, which is new product innovation, it can happen with through our marketing messaging, it can happen through pack sizes, it can happen through all those things. A lot of times people focus on just the new product innovation. And by the way, I think our new product innovation is good, but it's like 5 -- it will be 5% of our business this year and the rest of the 95% is really what drives profitability and growth in household penetration.
And so I will -- so the key for us is to make sure we have innovation that's relevant category-by-category, and sometimes that's messaging, sometimes that's news, sometimes that's having the right pack sizes in place, and other times it's new product innovation. Fortunately, I've said it before, so I'm maybe at the risk of just repeating myself. But as we look broadly landing in the second quarter, I feel good that we have good new product innovation on our $1 billion brands. We also have stepped up levels of advertising. You'll see some -- I think some exciting advertising on Totino's coming here starting in the second quarter, as well as new products from Old El Paso and new Old El Paso soups that we've launched in the marketplace, as well as news on our core-like, flakier biscuits.
So it really is -- and I go category-by-category, but everything I just mentioned is innovation on a $1 billion brand. And I think that's the key, when you have good ideas on big brands, you tend to do better. And I think we have differentially good ideas on big brands, which by the way includes Blue Buffalo, not just North American retail.