New baby formula brand to launch in major supermarkets that’s cheaper than Cow & Gate, Aptamil and HiPP

A TRENDY baby formula brand is launching a cut-price “affordable” version, amid concerns over spiralling prices.

The new Bonya formula, produced by the company behind Kendamil, will be nearly half the price of its premium Kendamil Organic product and around a third cheaper than most other major brands on the market.

Getty

It comes after parents were left fuming after a popular baby formula brand has disappeared from supermarket shelves.

Kendamill’s classic and organic powder formula has been missing from stores due to supply issues, with the issue not expected to be fully resolved for three months.

The product – which is made with whole milk from grass-fed cows – is designed for young infants and is often used as a substitute for breast milk.

All baby formula must contain the same nutritional composition by law, so cheaper brands have all the nutrients babies need.

Bonya will cost £8.45 for an 800g box of powdered formula – or around 23p per 150ml bottle when mixed with water into liquid.

By contrast, Kendamil Organic is £15 for 800g, or 40p per 150ml bottle, and while the standard Kendamil Classic is £12 for 800g, or 32p per bottle.

The new product will be nearly £10 less per box than the most expensive formula on the market, Aptamil Advanced, which costs £18 for 800g.

Kendamil – which was reportedly used by the Princess of Wales for Prince Louis – was singled out by the market watchdog last year after its profit margins more than quadrupled in two years.

Independent experts have also highlighted how it raised prices on its organic range between 2023 and 2024, while other brands dropped prices or kept them static.

The launch of Bonya – which will be available in Tesco and Sainsbury’s from Monday November – follows reports of parents struggling to buy all brands of formula, with some skipping their own meals to afford it or watering it down, putting babies’ health at risk.

Charity Sebby’s Corner, which supports struggling families in London and the South East, said it had seen a 42 per cent increase in requests for baby formula in the past six months.

Three out of four UK babies are bottle-fed by the time they are six weeks old, according to the charity Unicef. Kendamil estimates around one in three formula-fed babies in Britain consume its products.

Parents using Healthy Start vouchers, a weekly £8.50 voucher from the Government to help parents on low incomes feed their children, will be able to use them to buy Bonya.

The cheaper Aldi Mamia formula (£7.09 per 800g) and SMA Little Steps (£7.95 for 800g in most supermarkets) can also be bought with the vouchers.

The markets watchdog, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), has been looking into the formula industry after prices rose by up to 25 per cent between 2021 and 2023. Manufacturers have been accused by independent experts of ‘greedflation’ – artificially raising prices to maximise profits.

The launch of Bonya comes ahead of the publication of the CMA’s interim report into its findings, which is due imminently.

In a previous report last year, the CMA warned profit margins on formula milk sold in the UK were some of the highest in the food industry.

It singled out Kendamil as an example, highlighting how the company’s profit margin had jumped from around 4 per cent to nearly 20 per cent between the 2020 and 2022 financial years.

Its net profits soared six-fold from £1 million to £6.7 million over the same period, it reported.

And between April 2023 and May 2024, while all other major UK powdered infant formula brands lowered prices or kept them static, the price of Kendamil Organic rose slightly from £14.75 to £15, according to analysis by the infant public health charity First Steps Nutrition Trust.

But its Kendamil Classic formula remained £12 for an 800g tin – cheaper than market leading brands Aptamil and SMA.

The company will use profits from its Kendamil brand and take “smaller [profit] margins” on its Bonya range to donate one box of Bonya to food banks for every ten sold.

It costs less to make because it is packaged in a box instead of a tin and uses added milk fats as an ingredient, instead of processing whole milk.

The formula is vegetarian, kosher and halal, and does not contain fish or palm oils which are present in some other brands.

But unlike Kendamil, which is the only formula brand made in the UK, Bonya will be manufactured in Europe and will not use British milk.

Co-founder Will McMahon said: “This is a game-changing low price for a formula product parents can feel good about.

“Families on low incomes are forced to buy lower-priced formulas. We think there is more this industry could do [to help] so we are leading by example in trying to offer the best product at lower prices.”

He said the company could not lower its prices further because it had to remain profitable to “survive” in a tough market, fight off legal challenges from multinational competitors and expand the business to keep up with demand.

Kendamil is investing £40 million in tripling the size of its factory so it can produce more formula, after several instances of shortages of the brand in recent months.

The CMA estimates families could save more than £500 in the first year of a baby’s life through buying cheaper formula.

But research has shown parents are often pushed into buying more expensive options by “exploitative” marketing which presents some formula as being ‘better’ for babies – even though they are all nutritionally the same.

Dr Vicky Sibson, director of First Steps Nutrition Trust, said the launch of cheaper products was a positive step forward in terms of making formula more affordable, but emphasised that all companies could lower prices across all their products.

She added that the composition of infant formula was strictly controlled and there was “a lack of evidence” that adding ingredients like milk fats had any health benefits.

“Parents might not want to buy products containing items like palm oil for environmental reasons,”she said.

“But infant formula is nutritionally complete, which means every brand must have the same balance of things like fats, protein and essential vitamins and minerals.

“These nutrients may come from different sources but all the ingredients are heavily processed into similar constituent parts before being put together to make formula.”