Snack maker Mondelez is employing a new generative AI tool to reduce marketing content production costs by 30% to 50%, a senior executive told Reuters. The packaged food company began developing this tool last year in collaboration with IT firm Accenture and expects it to be capable of producing short TV ads ready to air by next year’s holiday season, and possibly for the 2027 Super Bowl, said Jon Halvorson, Mondelez’s global senior vice president of consumer experience. The Cadbury chocolate producer has invested over $40 million in the tool, Halvorson added, noting that savings would increase if the tool can create more complex videos. Facing tariffs and declining shopper budgets, Mondelez—like other consumer goods firms—is adopting AI to cut fees paid to advertising agencies and accelerate the development and launch of new products. Competitors such as Kraft Heinz, known for macaroni and cheese, and Coca-Cola have also experimented with AI for advertising. In 2024, Coke ran AI-generated holiday ads, though some consumers mocked the computer-generated figures for lacking authentic emotion. Mondelez is not yet incorporating human likenesses into its AI-generated content. It currently uses content from the new tool on social media for Chips Ahoy cookies in the U. S. and Milka chocolate in Germany. An eight-second Milka video depicts waves of chocolate flowing over a wafer, with varied backgrounds tailored to different consumer targets. The cost of producing animations “is in the hundreds of thousands, ” Halvorson said.

“This kind of setup is orders of magnitude smaller. ” In the U. S. , Oreo will apply the tool for product pages on Amazon and Walmart starting in November. Mondelez also plans to deploy the tool shortly for Lacta chocolate and Oreo in Brazil, and for Cadbury in the UK, Halvorson stated. Tina Vaswani, vice president of digital enablement and data, emphasized that humans will always review the tool’s output to prevent errors. Mondelez enforces guidelines that prohibit promoting unhealthy eating habits, vaping, over-consumption, emotionally manipulative language, and offensive stereotypes, according to a company document from the Chicago-based firm.