The 2014 report showed that Lay’s was the world’s third most-chosen food brand, just behind Knorr and Maggi. Frito-Lay’s flagship snack was selected 1.5 billion times in 2013 by households world wide. These households selected the brand on average six times each year. Global penetration (the number of households buying the brand) was up only slightly from 2012 (+0.5%), but Doritos and Cheetos skyrocketed.
Doritos exploded into the top 50 most-chosen fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) list for the first time, chosen 540 million times in 2013 - up 6% on 2012. Cheetos grew its brand reach by 9% and placed 38 in the top 50 list.
All this stretched PepsiCo’s global reach a further 3%. “We’re talking about billions of choices – a 3% increase is significant,” said Alison Martin, global project leader for Brand Footprint at Kantar Worldpanel.
“Overall snacking is up 2.7% in reach points globally for 2013, and it has definitely been Cheetos, Lay’s and Doritos that have been the star performers in the snacking category,” she told BakeryandSnacks.com.
All three brands were among the 10 fastest-rising brands in Kantar’s top 50.
Martin said there were a number of factors that had underpinned the growth, including PepsiCo’s actions to align better with health and drive deeper consumer engagement using global campaigns.
Snacks and health – enabling co-existence
“There’s this real attention on health and snacking. Obviously PepsiCo appreciate that and you can see they’re responding,” she said.
In Mexico under the Cheetos brand, for example, the snack titan had launched a family campaign ‘Let’s Jump Together with Chester Cheetos’ that encouraged exercise and in Brazil, a baked range with 25% less salt and fat.
“You can see clearly that PepsiCo understands health is an important issue,” Martin said.
Crowd/consumer engagement
PepsiCo had also excelled in consumer engagement across world markets, she said.
Lay’s involved consumers with flavor campaigns, she said, while Doritos globalized its logo and packaging and launched the ‘For the Bold’ global campaign
encouraging consumer brand engagement.
“Brands want people to be talking about them… It’s about creating conversations, engaging with their targets.” she said.
“For snacking brands, there’s always something slightly different for different people and for PepsiCo it’s all about understanding different occasions. And they’re doing it very well.”
Snacking: You need to play an active role in obesity
Asked how other snack makers could build traction with brands across the globe, Martin said they had to be committed to understanding differences across markets, particularly in terms of health.
“You also need to think of obesity. It is a problem, and you need to think about playing an active role. It’s about being a brand with purpose. You can still be a snacking brand, but help families exercise,” she said.
Martin said it was also about being focused on snacking occasions and target consumers. “There isn’t a one-size-fits-all strategy, but PepsiCo have a deep and broad range of products with different focuses and different targets, and they use multi-channel campaigns to bring that alive,” she said.
Kantar Worldpanel’s Brand Footprint 2014 report spanned 35 countries worldwide, covering 53% of the global population to find out what brands were being chosen in the food, beverage, nutrition, beauty and homecare sectors.