Walkers makes Sunbites HFSS compliant and unveils recycled plastic packs

PepsiCo has reformulated Walkers Sunbites to make them HFSS compliant and transitioned them to new packs made with 50% recycled plastic.

Experts at PepsiCo’s R&D centre in Leicester ran four trials over six months to find a way to reduce the sugar content in a Sunbites chip by more than half.

According to PepsiCo, sugar was “a bigger contributor to the crunch than the taste” of Sunbites, so the team experimented with the proportions of the four wholegrains used to replicate the texture of the original recipe.

They also altered the amount of water added to the dough, the speed at which it went through the extruder during production and reduced the amount of salt in the seasoning.

The reformulated Sunbites bolster Walkers’ existing range of non-HFSS snacks, which includes 45% Less Salt, Baked, Doritos Dippers and PopWorks.

Walkers last year set an ambition to make snacks that were non-HFSS or sold in portions of under 100 calories comprise 50% of its sales by 2025.

The crisps giant claimed it was now “over halfway to reaching this goal – with 30% of the snack brand’s sales now made up of healthier snacks”.

Plus, the move to the new packs would eliminate the use of 200 tonnes of fossil-based plastic by the end of 2025, it added.

“The Sunbites transformation marks our ongoing commitment to offering products that are better for both people and planet,” said PepsiCo UK sustainable packaging lead Gareth Callan.

“We’re working hard to reinvent our packaging. To help us do this at scale, we are urging the UK government to recognise the role that chemical recycling and other emerging mechanical technologies could play in creating demand for food-contact flexible plastics – including the modification of the Plastic Packaging Tax to stimulate a circular economy for packaging in the UK.”