Actual distribution of Cronobacter spp. in industrial batches of powdered infant formula and consequences for performance of sampling strategies

► Sampling results are clearly different in a recalled and reference batch of powdered infant formula (PIF). ► Cronobacter spp. are heterogeneously distributed in the recalled batch of PIF. ► Clusters of cells are present with a low frequency (8 out of 2290 samples). ► Taking more and smaller samples improves the performance of the sampling plans. ► Compared to random, random stratified sampling improves the detection probability.