Sunny Delight has turned to UK parents to help rebrand its juice drink as healthier and parent-friendly as part of a new comeback programme.

New formula: parents are delighted with the changes

Sunny Delight Beverages Company (SDBC), which bought the Sunny Delight brand 18 months ago from Procter & Gamble, said the brand's future lay in innovation and the first phase of its ?reinvention? programme included new products and flavours, product reformulation and consumer education.

Central to the changes and brand strategy has been the Parents Advisory Group (PAG), which SDBC set up to enable it ?to get closer to parents to find out what they like and what they think we should be doing to take the brand forward?. The PAG provided feedback on new product development, design and communicating with consumers. The biggest concerns of the PAG were the levels of sugar and artificial ingredients and preservatives in the drinks.

Paul Nicholls, commercial manager in the UK and Republic of Ireland, said the company has acted on the parents' feedback. The original Sunny Delight drink now contains no artificial colours or flavours and the sugar content has been reduced by 8%. ?That's 25% less than other leading juice drinks on the market,? said Nicholls. The next step is to remove the preservatives, which SDBC is currently working on. ?We are mindful that the job is not done until we make an all natural Sunny Delight,? said Nicholls.

The drinks also carry new labelling, designed in collaboration with the PAG, featuring Guideline Daily Amount (GDA) information on the front of the pack. Instrumental in the relaunch is communicating the changes to parents, said Nicholls. The company is investing ?5m over the summer on a marketing programme, which will include in-store sampling, an extensive campaign in women's magazines and on local and national radio.

All new flavours, including the latest variant ? orange and pineapple ? will only be introduced to the no added sugar range, which accounts for 60% of the brand's sales.

The SDBC is working on a raft of new concepts. It will be launching Smart Start, a pure fruit juice fortified with omega three and vitamins A,C and E, at the end of September. It will be available in one-litre Tetra in two flavours, orange and apple, and targeting the breakfast market. Also, early 2007 will see the launch of Sunny Delight smoothies.