Glico Asia Pacific sweeps Designed in Singapore Award in Food category

It rolled out exclusively Singaporean Pocky flavours with local YaKun.

To build affinity with the local Pocky range with Singaporeans, Glico Asia Pacific has partnered with local partner Ya Kun to come up with a fun, exclusively Singaporean twist on the usual flavours, through introducing Kaya Toast and Kopi-O variants. Both parties believed that Pocky’s strong appeal and innovation could let Ya Kun’s business evolve to the next level, as Pocky’s core value of “Share happiness” fit perfectly with Ya Kun’s “The Toast That Binds” motto.

“By collaborating, we were giving Singaporeans more opportunities to ‘Share happiness’ with our traditional local breakfast through Pocky,” said Ian Leong, Regional Brand Manager of Glico Asia Pacific. For this innovation, the company has scored the Designed in Singapore Award for the Food category.

Pocky X Ya Kun was rolled out in July 2019 as a featured product of the Singapore Food Festival (SFF) by the Singapore Tourism Board. It was a sellout success at SFF ‘STREATS’ event at the Promenade, where it was made available exclusively by Ya Kun outlets.

A second wave was released into modern trade (MT) this year.

In the pursuit of giving Singaporeans a taste of their childhood through iconic breakfast dishes Kaya Toast and Kopi-O, a thorough research and development process took place between Glico Asia Pacific’s R&D head and the Ya Kun team.

“Their secret recipe handmade from quality ingredients everyday” is the secret behind Ya Kun’s iconic breakfast dishes, said Ian. “Our theme of ‘Contemporary Tradition’ was the foundation for collaboration and design to let consumers experience the traditional breakfast in a whole new way.”

The final product was the result of many trials with the R&D team to translate the deep nuances and comforting traditional taste into a Pocky stick, said Glico Asia Pacific.

In result, the Pocky X Ya Kun range was a resounding success. “We had exceeded our forecasts in both 2019 and 2020” said Glico Asia Pacific. “In MT, the momentum gave our regular Pocky products a 40% growth.”

Meanwhile, Ya Kun also experienced a surge of sales and media exposure due to the excitement among consumers for this collaboration.