News on Chips and Snacks from Northern America

April 22, 2008

Gov. Schwarzenegger Participates in Launch of Frito-Lay North America's Solar Concentrator Field

Today, on the 38th anniversary of the first national Earth Day celebration, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger highlights California's environmental efforts. He highlighted the ability to protect business and the environment at the same time by helping lau...

April 18, 2008

Brothers-All-Natural Introduces the First-Ever Naturally Fat-Free Potato Crisps

Brothers-All-Natural introduces Potato Crisps, the first all-natural, fat-free potato chip created using a revolutionary freeze-drying process with no added oils, preservatives or Olestra -- simply real sliced potatoes, fresh ingredients, and sea salt....

April 10, 2008

Frito-Lay launches 'Pinch of Salt', low sodium versions of its best selling Chips and Snacks

PepsiCo's Frito-Lay North America business unit announced today the launch of Pinch of Salt, a low-sodium version of some of its most popular brands – Lay's potato chips, Tostitos tortilla chips, Fritos corn chips and Ruffles potato chips. While Frito...

April 09, 2008

New Death Valley Chipotle(TM) Kettle(TM) Brand Potato Chip Heats Up Summer Snacking

Kettle Foods is spicing up the summer with the arrival of its newest Kettle(TM) brand Potato Chip, Death Valley Chipotle(TM), just in time for barbeque season. The winner of the fourth annual People's Choice campaign, Death Valley Chipotle(TM), is set ...

Shearer Foods new potato chip plant announcement

April 08, 2008

Shearer's Announces Plans to Build New Potato chips Manufacturing Plant in Ohio

On April 8, 2008, Shearer’s Foods, Inc. officially announced their plans to build the first LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environment Design) Gold Certified food manufacturing plant in the State of Ohio. Chief Executive Officer Bob Shearer and the Sh...

April 08, 2008

US farmers in 2008: less corn, more soybean

Farmers in the US are expected to plant significantly fewer corn crops than last year, pushing the price up to a record high of $6 a bushel, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) warned last week.The news indicates even more pressure on food manufact...

March 31, 2008

PepsiCo and Strauss Group Complete Formation of Joint Venture Sabra to sell hummus

PepsiCo and Strauss Group announced that the formation of a joint venture partnership to operate Sabra, the top-selling and fastest-growing maker of hummus, has been completed. Sabra had sales of $65 million in 2007. Last year, total U.S. sales of humm...

March 31, 2008

Bart Connors Selected To Lead 2008-2009 United States Potato Board

Bart Connors of Pasco, WA, was elected Chairman of the United States Potato Board (USPB) on March 14 at the organization’s Annual Meeting in Denver, CO. Connors is the general manager of Skone & Connors Produce.

March 27, 2008

Conagra Foods Reports Strong EPS Growth and Improved Sales for Consumer Foods

ConAgra Foods, Inc., (NYSE: CAG) one of North America's leading packaged food companies, today reported results for the fiscal 2008 third quarter ended Feb. 24, 2008. Current-quarter diluted EPS from continuing operations was $0.63;items impacting com...

March 27, 2008

Frito-Lay Puts the Sun in SunChips

The newest demonstration of solar power(figuratively) is coming from the Frito-Lay division of PepsiCo, which is using the sun to help transform its SunChips line of multigrain snack chips into a “green” brand. The initiative is centered on the additio...

March 25, 2008

Checking the chips at Utz

About 16,000 pounds of potato chips per hour rolling off the lines is a hefty amount. That's what Utz Quality Foods produces on average at its High Street plant in Hanover, said Vice President of Manufacturing Paul Schaum. With that many chips, not t...

March 20, 2008

Candy man builds sweet business

Who knew that candy around the checkouts could be big business?That's been the case for Jim Schweikert and his Chandler-based company Liberty Distribution Co. LLC, which sells candy bars, sweet tarts, bubble gum, potato chips and hundreds of other snac...

March 14, 2008

Humpty Dumpty Potato-chip plant failure worries P.E.I. development minister

The closure of the Humpty Dumpty potato-chip plant in Summerside has P.E.I. Development Minister Richard Brown concerned about the province's investment there. The plant's 36 employees were told this week they'd be out of work by May. When it opened ...

March 10, 2008

Phil Lempert's Sunflower Oil 101

Frito-Lay is making sunflower oil famous, they are one of the few companies that decided in the move away from Trans fats to use sunflower rather than returning to palm oil. It is important to note that Trans fats were originally developed to replace ...

Bulk potato storage for processing potatoes in the United Kingdom

March 05, 2008

Quality of Potatoes for Processing and the effect of Potato Storage; Some Basics

The amount of reducing sugars in the potato are responsible for the colour formation of fried products. So if potatoes are too high in reducing sugars, they are not suitable for processing.

March 05, 2008

Snack market set for billion dollar growth

The global snack market will be worth almost $300bn (€197.8bn) by 2010, as manufacturers move towards healthier products as well as developing markets, a new report predicts. The 'Snack Foods' report, released yesterday by Global Industry Analysts(G...

March 03, 2008

Kids’ weight gain linked to salty snacks and soda

Nothing goes better with salty than sweet and that might be the reason why kids who snack on salty foods tend to drink calorie-rich sodas and put on more weight, an article in Hypertension suggests. It’s well known that eating salty foods can make you...

February 27, 2008

Chips and Snacks Production going local, very local

Today we want to address a new development in the snack sector which I would call: 'Snack production going local' . Two companies, 'Fresh Chips' and 'The Chippery' each offer a different concept that eliminates the industrial potato chips production line or the snack factory and replaces it with a mini factory you may soon find on your street corner, literally.