BOSTON — An ability to deliver on consumer trends has helped lift the coffee business at Orrville, Ohio-based J.M. Smucker Co., said Mark T. Smucker, chairman, president and chief executive officer.

Mr. Smucker told participants during the Barclays Global Consumer Staples Conference in Boston on Sept. 5 that the company believes in its right to win in the dry coffee aisle, but also has its sights set on the consumer trend toward liquid concentrates.

“And since consumers continue to customize and try to recreate maybe their favorite coffee shop beverages at home, those multi-serve bottles, which have… 20 servings in it has — we believe there’s a significant opportunity there to capture that consumer as they continue to create those ‘cold coffee cocktails at home,’” he said.  “So a lot of positive on the coffee category. We feel very bullish on our ability to continue to perform there.”

Asked about the impact Smucker has seen from some of the action around volume and share, Tucker H. Marshall, chief financial officer at Smucker, said the company continues to march on.

“From a big-picture standpoint, the momentum in our Coffee portfolio continues against at-home leadership with Folgers, Dunkin’ and

Cafe Bustelo,” Mr. Marshall said. “And on a year-over-year basis, the overall top line for Coffee will be slightly flat to down. And that’s largely due to the pricing and the deflation that we have recognized in terms of improved price points and sharpening it for the consumer. But we are

seeing underlying volume momentum, particularly as you think about Folgers, Dunkin’ and Cafe Bustelo. So we do expect continued momentum there.”

When asked about expanding into new coffee formats, Mr. Smucker said the company’s brands are well equipped to play in those spaces. 

“Obviously, the launch of Dunkin’ and then, in a couple of quarters, the launch of the Bustelo liquid products is further along that strategy,” Mr. Smucker said. “Nevertheless, as we talked about M&A generally, we have said a couple of things pretty consistently. We are interested if we find the right assets at the right price, expanding in our existing categories, primarily Coffee and Pets, notably Pet Snacks, those would probably be the first places we would like to go, if we could less so in take frozen because obviously, we have a tiger by the tail with Uncrustables and want to continue to focus on Uncrustables."