Bagged snacks 2024: soggy snacks find price hikes and HFSS reformulation hard going

Inflation is past its worst, but it’s not yet done with bagged snacks. A raft of big names – including Walkers, Doritos, Walkers Max and KP – have seen volumes fall this year as Prices rose. Walkers, for instance, shed 2.6 million kilos as average price increased 4.1%. Clearly, not all shoppers were happy to swallow costlier nibbles – though they did at least push up the value of crisps & snacks by 5.4%.

“Growth across crisps, snacks and popcorn continues to be driven by inflation,” says Claire Hooper, group marketing director at Seabrook owner Calbee.

In recent times, vegetable oil and energy prices were the biggest culprits. The biggest cause of inflation this time – at least for crisps – was higher potato prices. Bad weather led to “a phase of potato shortage in both volume and quality across the UK”, explains Robert Strathern, MD of Fairfields Farm.

However, this is not the only pressure crisps face, nor does it explain the problems of non-potato snacks. Across the category, HFSS restrictions continue to have a deleterious effect on sales. While two years have passed since rules on product positioning in stores came into effect, the challenge of reformulation remains high-risk.

“There is much talk about HFSS,” says a spokesperson for Golden Wonder owner Tayto. “The challenge is that, while plenty of non-HFSS products have been launched, many have failed to live up to consumer expectations. So sales have struggled.”

Tayto launches non-HFSS products only “when we’re confident there is no compromise, such as with Golden Wonder Tangy Toms,” the spokesperson adds.

Tayto’s nervousness about reformulation makes Pepsico seem all the braver. In October, it relaunched its £287.3m Doritos brand as non-HFSS (see Top Launch, below). “We have seen the demand for smarter snacking choices increase across the channel,” says PepsiCo chief marketing officer Fernando Kahane. “Therefore, as a category leader, we are on track to make 50% of Walkers snack sales come from healthier alternatives by [the end of] 2025.”

Doritos is not the only brand combining HFSS-compliant products with the craze for spicy flavours. McCoy’s rolled out a six-pack of non-HFSS Epic Eats variant Flamin’ Fajita in June. “Hot/spicy is a hugely important trend,” stresses Kevin McNair, KP snacks marketing director.

The McCoy’s launch came a month after Jacob’s added non-HFSS Crinklys Chilli Beef. It taps “the huge, growing market for spicy or meaty flavours”, says Aslı Özen Turhan, chief marketing officer at Jacob’s owner Pladis.

Demand for snacks with a kick was also highlighted in February, when viral TikTok brand Takis secured its first permanent grocery listing. It rolled its rolled tortilla chips in Fuego and Volcano variants – the former promising “extreme heat” – into Co-op.

PepsiCo also looks poised to grow its spicy portfolio further. In August it applied to register Roulette, Ignite, Exxtra Flamin’ Hot and Exxtreme Heat as trademarks with the Intellectual Property Office under classes 29 and 30, covering potato chips and tortilla chips. It hints at either an imminent expansion of the supplier’s multi-brand Extra Flamin’ Hot offer or revival of Doritos Roulette, which once featured an on-pack warning of “ultra-spicy” chips amid milder ones. Or possibly both.

Setting lips aflame isn’t the only way to drive sales, though. Another is offering practical formats. KP Nuts, for instance, has been tapping on-the-go snacking fuelled by hybrid working patterns, says McNair. In July, the brand added Honey Roast Peanut Snack Pack.

Its popcorn sister brand, on the other hand, have gone big. Butterkist unveiled a limited-edition 180g sharing pack in September, in partnership with Universal Pictures. It was to mark the cinema release of Wicked – “one of the most anticipated movie releases of 2024”, according to McNair.

The Butterkist launch certainly makes sense. As NIQ analytics executive Alice Chrystal points out, “sharing formats in the crisps and snacks category have experienced the highest growth this year”.

What sells well next year is anyone’s guess, however, as brands may face a fresh challenge in 2025. While still getting to grips with HFSS, questions over their ultra-processed credentials will only grow.

UPFs challenge ahead

UPFs is a topic that came well and truly to the fore this year, and some bagged snack brands are already moving to address it.

“Parents are becoming more and more aware of UPF and wanting options that are UPF-free,” notes Sally Dorling, marketing manager at Marigold Healthy Foods.

As such, the supplier launched vegan, low-calorie Popcorn Plus in January, and picked up a silver medal for it at The Grocer’s New Product & Packaging Awards in November.

While there’s a “huge grey area around what UPF is”, says Dorling, the ingredients list of Popcorn Plus – wholegrain corn, rapeseed oil, nutritional yeast and sea salt – put it in safe territory.

“This is why we put clear messaging on the front of the pack,” she adds, signposting its high vitamin and low-calorie content.

Brands that crack the UPF conundrum will likely enjoy a substantial point of difference – as will those that offer meaningful sustainability solutions. This year saw Pringles launch a kerbside recyclable paper tube into Tesco in January. The pack swapped the typical steel base for a paper one but retained the recyclable plastic lid.

Three months later, the British Snack Co claimed another category first when its kerbside recyclable paper crisp packet launched into pubs. Created in partnership with sustainable packaging manufacturer EvoPak, the inside is coated with a microscopic layer of aluminium and a layer of water-soluble polymer resin. It’s the result of a project that was “basically my life for the past 18 months”, says British Snack Co founder Tom Lock.

The tech may soon be in supermarkets. The British Snack Co plans to pour its Awfully Posh peanuts brand into similar packaging.

“Awfully Posh is sold in supermarkets, so there is a good chance you’ll see that on shelves, probably in early 2025,” says Lock.

That ought to spice up the category.

Read more: Bagged snacks 2023: Crisp brands prioritise exciting NPD