Area native gets creative with special Oreo flavors

Hollidaysburg native Allison Kristofco is a senior project manager at Oreo Limited Editions portfolio owned by Mondelez International, formerly Kraft Foods. Kristofco works on a team that develops specialty cookies, from unique flavor combinations, different fillings and cookie embossments. Courtesy photo
If you’ve dunked any of these specialty flavors of Oreos — Oreo x Super Mario, Red Velvet Oreos, Hot Cocoa Oreos, Oreo Churro, Oreo x Sour Patch Kids (SPK) and the recently released Oreo x Star Wars, you’ve enjoyed the labors of former Hollidaysburg native Allison Kristofco.
Kristofco is a senior project manager at Oreo Limited Editions portfolio owned by Mondelez International, formerly Kraft Foods. Kristofco lives in New Jersey and works on a team that develops specialty cookies. From unique flavor combinations, different fillings and cookie embossments, each limited edition represents 18 months’ research and development, risk assessment, testing, marketing and more.
As a project manager, she manages timelines, runs meetings, oversees the budget and keeps the project on track from initial prototypes to the launch, when cookies hit store shelves. Limited edition cookies are baked at various bakery locations throughout the United States and shipped to grocery stores and retailers nationally.
She declined to say how many packages are in a limited edition run, except to say it is in the six figures. When stores run out of the product, that’s it — the limited edition cookies are made once.
A 2010 graduate of Bishop Guilfoyle, her former high school math teacher Suzanne (Thoma) Provenzano remembers Kristofco as “extremely organized and creative. She was always very meticulous and took pride in her work.”
She was named the 2024 Wilkes University Female Athlete of the Year for her outstanding accomplishments in tennis while an undergrad at Wilkes, located in Wilkes-Barre, Luzerne County.
Kristofco had been playing tennis recreationally but hasn’t played since the unexpected death of her 63-year-old father, Tom, from a ruptured brain aneurysm in September. Her father taught her how to play tennis and attended all her matches in high school and college.
Lisa Georgiana, director of advancement at Bishop Guilfoyle Academy, recalled her as a
“championship tennis player and an outstanding volleyball player at BG. These experiences helped her develop a keen sense of healthy competition, teamwork and leadership skills. Certainly, these skills that she is applying in her professional life are what leads to her successful career.”
Indeed, it is the collaboration and striving for shared goals that Kristofco said she most enjoys.
On June 10, her team launched Oreo x Star Wars, which tastes like a regular Oreo but is visually different. The uniqueness, novelty and fun is in the stamping of the chocolate cookie wafers and either red or blue filling. Each package has 10 unique character embossments representing the “dark side,” led by Darth Vader and filled with red cream, or the “light side,” led by Luke Skywalker and filled with blue cream. Customers don’t know which side of the Star Wars conflict is inside.
“The whole point is the surprise. You open the package and find out your destiny,” Kristofco said. “So far, it’s going well and there’s been a lot of social media hype around it. This partnership (with Disney) is the biggest partnership we’ve ever done.”
Working with Disney — owners of the Star Wars copyright — added additional layers to the complex process. For instance, Disney personnel inspected the character embossment in the bakeries.
“It’s a cool job,” Kristofco said. “Aside from the fact that it’s an interesting product, I love going to the store and seeing the limited edition products on the store shelves,” she said. In addition to the Star Wars cookies, here are the others she helped launch the past two years: Oreo Neapolitan, Oreo Brookie-O, Oreo Snickerdoodle, Oreo White Fudge, The Most Oreo Oreo, Oreo Blackout Cake, s’mOREO, Oreo Cotton Candy, Oreo x Super Mario, Red Velvet Oreos, Hot Cocoa Oreos, Oreo Black and White Cookie, Oreo Space Dunk, Oreo Dirt Cake, Oreo Churro and Oreo x SPK.
Kristofco has won multiple awards on several projects for Mondelez and works at the company’s office in East Hanover, N.J. The company is best known for its brands Nabisco, Cadbury, Philadelphia Cream Cheese and more.
She previously served as the project manager for cookies at the company, including Teddy Grahams, Nutter Butter, Newtons, Barnum’s and more. She began her career as customs coordinator, which was very data heavy. She continues her learning and has earned certifications in chain management from Penn State and in technical project management from Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Each cookie launch has a dedicated, cross-functional team of 10 to 15 people. Her position requires collaboration and connection with others.
“We all have input” during the prototype phase when the new product is taste tested by the team members and focus groups, she said. For instance, during the Sour Patch Kids cookie development process, they considered putting pieces of the gummy candies in the filling.
“It was very off-putting, so the final product didn’t have pieces in it,” she said. “It’s a very thorough process and most people don’t realize the amount of work that goes into what is on the store shelf. It takes a huge amount of work to do it by a group of people that work to develop products. It’s a real team effort to get them out the door.”
Legal team members are “very critical to be able to do these cool mashups. The product displays and social media work all has to have Disney approval.”
Food scientists, including “a huge number of Penn State grads,” work on the teams, she said. They and others have gone to big colleges and universities. Kristofco attended Wilkes University, which had an undergraduate enrollment of 2,000 last year. While in school, she wondered if “I’d be behind, but that was not the case. The stars aligned and I knew someone and could get my foot in the door.”
Five years ago when a role as a project manager opened, she said she lacked the background.
“I was willing to learn, was open-minded and intrigued by the work they did,” she recalled. It was about the time Game of Thrones Oreos came out.
“It was huge and so cool. I think seeing the interest and the passion I had about something like that was able to get me through another door,” Kristofco said.
Being open to taking some risks and taking a job where “you don’t feel like you’re an expert or you don’t have a background in it” is also important, she said. “I really do believe in hiring talent and training for the job. You can learn to do just about anything as long as somebody gives you the chance to do it.”
The Kristofco file
Name: Allison Kristofco
Age: 32
Residence: Boonton, N.J., formerly of Hollidaysburg
Family: Husband, Eric Hauer; mother, Janet (Horell) Kristofco; late father, Thomas Kristofco; sister, Lauren Kristofco, and her husband, Samuel Haddad, and their daughter, Kinsey Haddad; grandmother, Rita Horell; aunts and uncles in Altoona/Johnstown area
Education: Bishop Guilfoyle High school, 2010; Bachelor of Business Administration – Marketing, Wilkes University, 2014; and an MBA in 2016
Employment: Senior Product Change Manager, Oreo Limited Editions, Mondelez International; co-editor of the Mondelez Supply Chain DE&I Newsletter
Community service: Part of a team that volunteers at a local food pantry in N.J., and participants in food drives/collections for other local charities.
Awards and honors: Multiple Values in Action awards at Mondelez, 2024 Wilkes University Female Athlete of the Year, First Team All Conference (MAC Conference) 2012-14, Winningest Female Tennis player in Wilkes tennis program history (2014), four-time MAC Conference Team Champion (four consecutive NCAA Tournament appearances)