Kraft Heinz Adds $100M to Marketing — Fewer Media Partners, Bigger Bets

Kraft Heinz is adding $100 million to its turnaround plan, with most of it concentrated on marketing investment, the company said in prepared remarks for its Q2 earnings. Marketing will now represent at least 6% of net sales in 2026, up half a percentage point.

What convinced them to spend more

The move follows the packaged foods giant stating it "overdelivered" on expectations in the first half, when it began deploying $600 million of incremental spend across product superiority, pricing, marketing, sales and R&D.

Asked on the earnings call whether the increased investment was working, CEO Steven Cahillane said: "I see it's working virtually everywhere we're putting it. And so condiments is probably the first area where we've seen really marked improvement. Heinz is back to growth as it should be, strong growth — strong consumption growth — which is terrific. So across the board in the U.S., we're seeing better performance."

By the numbers

• $100 million: additional incremental spend on the turnaround, much of it marketing
• 6%: share of net sales expected to go to marketing in 2026
• 1.4%: decline in net sales in Q2 2026

Fewer partners, heavier bets

The marketer of Philadelphia Cream Cheese, Jell-O and Ore-Ida has been directing dollars toward a smaller number of heavier-hitting media partners. That shows up in a five-year pact with the NFL, work around America250 celebrations, and a strategic partnership with The Walt Disney Company covering media outlets, cruise lines, parks and events.

"Not only are we spending more to support our brands, but we are spending more efficiently," Cahillane said. "We've reallocated dollars towards higher-return brand media, improved efficiency through fewer, more effective media partners, and launched stronger consumer-driven creative. Importantly, we're measuring direct sales impact, and we are seeing clear improvements."

Brand-level campaigns are contributing too — Heinz's "It Has to be Heinz" and Philadelphia's "Really Philly Good," which positions cream cheese as a kitchen fixture, are helping rebuild equity and create "green shoots" in the U.S. Headcount increases have also been targeted at marketing and sales.

Context: the split is on hold

Kraft Heinz paused plans to split into two companies in February, viewing its problems as fixable. Q2 net sales fell 1.4% to $6.3 billion, with North America down 2.7% for the period ended June 27 — results that still beat internal expectations and analyst estimates. The company raised its full-year organic net sales outlook to a decline of 0.5% to 2%, from 1.5% to 3.5%.

The transferable part

Raising marketing's share of sales while sales are still negative is not a common call. What makes it defensible here is not the increase but its conditions: the company named the category where lift appeared first (condiments), consolidated media partners to gain both leverage and execution quality, and stated explicitly that direct sales impact is the measure.

For related plays on reusing existing brand equity instead of manufacturing new equity, see Goldfish Adds Better-for-You to Nostalgia — A 30-Year Platform Retooled for Parents and Oscar Mayer Marks the Wienermobile's 90th With a Hot Dog Cake.