Better Than Bouillon® is extending its premium paste-bouillon franchise into the world-cuisine corridor, launching four concentrated bases — Chicken Ramen, Tonkotsu Ramen, Pho, and Birria — under the brand's existing Culinary Collection line. Parent company Summit Hill Foods confirmed distribution has begun at Walmart and Albertsons, with additional retail doors rolling in across the broader grocery channel. Selection varies by retailer and location.
The four-SKU expansion marks a deliberate move into global cuisines that have generated sustained velocity gains in the broth, stock, and bouillon category, where shopper demand for restaurant-quality shortcuts continues to outpace the traditional chicken-and-beef base core. Better Than Bouillon holds a well-established position in the ambient broth aisle built on its paste format, which yields more servings per unit than ready-to-use liquid stock — an attribute that supports both value-perception messaging and favorable turn rates on a per-linear-foot basis.
Behind the SKUs
Each new base leans on authentic ingredient stacks rather than generic flavor profiles. The Chicken Ramen and Tonkotsu Ramen bases incorporate real chicken or pork, authentic shoyu sauce, and carry no-MSG-added positioning — a planogram-friendly claim in natural and conventional grocery alike. The Pho Base is built on real beef stock with ginger and aromatics, replicating a broth that traditionally requires six to twelve hours of simmering. The Birria Base draws on real beef stock, chili peppers, onion, paprika, and garlic to target one of the fastest-rising culinary trends in foodservice — one that has migrated aggressively from restaurant menus into the retail center store over the past two years.
Kyle Peterson, Chief Marketing Officer at Summit Hill Foods, framed the launch around the intersection of convenience and authenticity: "Our new Culinary Collection of global flavors bases deliver the restaurant-quality taste of ramen, pho, and birria with the trusted quality of Better Than Bouillon, making it easy to prepare authentic, flavorful meals in minutes instead of hours." The positioning is squarely aimed at scratch-curious consumers who treat cooking from trending global cuisines as an aspiration but are unwilling to invest multi-hour prep sessions.
Category and Competitive Context
The broth and bouillon segment has seen consistent dollar-sales growth driven by premiumization and the proliferation of global and functional sub-segments. Paste-format concentrates command higher retail price points than liquid broths and often deliver stronger category margin contribution — a dynamic that gives retailers reason to allocate incremental shelf space or secondary placement through end-caps and in-store displays. Better Than Bouillon's Culinary Collection extension effectively creates a new sub-section within the category, potentially pulling incremental TDPs rather than cannibalizing its existing Classic and Organic base assortments.
For grocery buyers and category managers, the Birria Base in particular warrants attention given birria's trajectory from regional Mexican-American foodservice staple to mainstream QSR and fast-casual menu item over the past 24 months. SKUs anchored to that flavor trend have demonstrated above-average velocities in early scan data across both conventional and natural/specialty channels. The ramen and pho entries likewise align with documented growth in Asian-inspired grocery products, where shopper basket size and repeat-purchase rates tend to track above category average.
With retail placement secured at two of the country's largest conventional grocery banners at launch, Summit Hill Foods is positioning the Culinary Collection global line for broad ACV penetration from the outset — a distribution posture that signals confidence in baseline velocity and suggests promotional support, potentially including TPR events and MCB programs, will accompany the rollout.
Written by Michael Politz, Author of Guide to Restaurant Success: The Proven Process for Starting Any Restaurant Business From Scratch to Success (ISBN: 978-1-119-66896-1), Founder of Food & Beverage Magazine, the leading online magazine and resource in the industry. Designer of the Bluetooth logo and recognized in Entrepreneur Magazine's "Top 40 Under 40" for founding American Wholesale Floral, Politz is also the Co-founder of the Proof Awards and the CPG Awards and a partner in numerous consumer brands across the food and beverage sector.
