Extending our State of the Industry presentations to the snack market this month, we’re focusing on new snack products, the perspective of snack manufacturers and product leaders and market sales. There’s plenty for snackers to celebrate. We’re snacking more than ever, according to a recent survey by The Hartman Group, and consumers are looking for wholesome snacks with clean labels, bold flavors and good taste. This annual report indicates that snacking is evolving into much more than a trite, quick, impulse food moment: Snacking is no longer swimming upstream when it comes to eating occasions. Snacking is here to stay and livelier than ever.
We found plenty of food for thought at May’s Sweets & Snack Expo and the National Restaurant Association’s annual expo. Sponsored by the National Confectioners Association, Sweets & Snacks was a treasure trove of all things crunchy, munchy, sweet and salty. New snacks included fruity chips; numerous popped, baked and puffed chips; vegetable-based crisp sticks; chipotle chips; deli-flavored and “dirty” potato chips (meaning that the skin is left on); rice-based crisps; hybrids of flavored, ridged, multigrain chips that team oats and potatoes, flax, sesame and caraway seeds (such as Herr’s new Good Natured Selects); pretzels covered in white chocolate, chocolate mint and drizzled peanut butter; and sticks that resemble French fries in horseradish, bacon, chicken and steak flavorings.