Jamba Juice Bets on a Food Strategy

(MoneyWatch)  Jamba Juice management hopes that adding solid-food items to its 733 stores across the country will help turn around weak sales and negative earnings.

Executives aren't revealing all of their future plans yet, but make whatever they have up their sleeves sounds significant. James White, the chain's president and CEO, said during the company's fourth-quarter conference call that Jamba has a "comprehensive food strategy" that will "transform our business model and company." That's a pretty serious turnaround from a strategy that has almost exclusively relied on a menu of juices and smoothies.

Last year, Jamba had a temporary pilot program with the chain Organic 2 Go in which it sold some of Organic's food products in its stores. It's over now, but White made it sound successful during the call. Maybe we'll see a longer-term paring between the two companies?

So far, Jamba's main food offering is oatmeal, and the company is pushing it with a major low-price promotion this month. The oatmeal strategy apparently worked for Starbucks when that chain started offering it last year.

At least one food blog is big on Jamba's oatmeal offering. In a recent taste test, the chain's oatmeal beat out competitors Au Bon Pain, Cosi, Maoz, Pret a Manger and Starbucks.

Jamba's management certainly needs to figure something out to turn things around. The Emeryville, Calif.-based company had a fourth-quarter net loss of $41.2 million and stores open at least 12 months saw sales slide 12 percent from the same prior-year period.