Snacks gear up for Super Bowl week
This week is a big one for the snacks category, as it leads up to the Super Bowl, which takes place Feb. 2 in Miami.
Shoppers across the country will be preparing to host or attend Super Bowl parties at someone’s home, and snacks will surely be on the table. But, to put some numbers behind it, Arlington, Va.-based SNAC International, a trade association for the snacking industry, commissioned data from IRI for the third year in a row to highlight which categories stood out the most last year.
For an overall look, snack food sales grew 10.3% to $404 million during Super Bowl week 2019, according to the IRI data. Sales during the week 2018 were $370 million.
Breaking down specific categories within snacks, dips reign supreme. The data showed a 53% spike in sales for items in the Dry Dip Mixes category, with shoppers making dips to bring to a party or for hosting. Refrigerated Dips for the lazier partygoer saw a 33% increase in sales, year over year.
On the receiving end of the dips, the data showed tortilla chips garnered a 24.3% increase in sales and potato chips saw an 11.8% increase. Pretzels saw a bump in sales by 14.5%.
SNAC said, in total, Americans consume 90 million pounds of snacks on Super Bowl Sunday.
The association told Store Brands that it didn't have a break down of how private label snacks did vs. national brands.
For national brands, this week is a big one as they roll out large, themed displays for their Super Bowl snacks. Affiliate brand Path to Purchase Institute recently published a look at Meijer’s Super Bowl splash with big displays from PepsiCo, Mondelez and more.
It will be interesting to see how private brand snacks merchandise in-store, cross-brand with national brands or apply other tactics to take a bite out of the snack bump that will happen this week.