Snack Chat

Night Time is the Right Time for Doritos

I believe great brands have a common trait: They are both timeless and contemporary.  Doritos is one of Frito-Lay’s brands that best fits this description, and Late Night -- the brand’s latest launch -- combines technology innovation and marketing magic to achieve both the timelessness of the Doritos name and the contemporary flavors that consumers crave.   

Frito-Lay launched Doritos nationally in 1966 (before my time at Frito-Lay), using superior manufacturing technology and marketing savvy to develop a great-tasting corn-based chip, flavored with cheese seasoning and named Doritos Nacho Cheese.  Before the launch, there was no such thing as “nacho cheese” flavoring in snack foods -- nachos was its own food!

In the last few years, Doritos’ growth has been fueled by further developments in sophisticated flavor technology and consumer marketing innovation.  We launched Collisions -- bags with two different flavors of chips inside -- as well as the Crash the Super Bowl consumer programs that encouraged Millennials (people born between 1980 and 1995) to take control and create an ad that could air during the Super Bowl. And this year, the winning consumer-created ad took the top spot on the USA TODAY Ad Meter!

It’s clear to me why Doritos is an American icon and a top-selling brand in supermarkets and convenience stores.  I believe that in 2009, Doritos will continue attracting long-time fans and grow in popularity with new fans as Doritos Late Night hits the market.  Late Night is available in two flavors, Tacos at Midnight and Last Call Jalapeno Popper, and both use a seasoning technology called “flavor plus.”

"Flavor plus has been a big success internationally for Frito-Lay, and now we're bringing it to the United States," says Michael Fox, the Marketing Manager on Doritos.  "Late Night delivers a rich multi-sensory experience -- there is a deep aroma combined with a multi-layered taste, the ‘flavor plus.’  In Tacos at Midnight, you can taste the sour cream, the meat and then lettuce –- the layers of flavor you taste when eating a taco.  We think it's the perfect snack for late-night studying."

To market Doritos Late Night, Michael says the TV advertising captures the inner-most part of the personality that tends to be revealed only at night.  In one TV ad, a beautiful young woman is driving through the city, and you see the city transform from day-time to night-time with each bite of Late Night she takes.  The new advertising starts at the end of April and will air on MTV, BET, Spike and other networks that Millennials watch.

While Doritos Late Night flavors have only been in the market for a few weeks, the word is quickly spreading among Doritos lovers.  There is a buzz already on Twitter, and Frito-Lay has received numerous compliments on the consumer hot line.  Tell me what you think of Doritos Late Night.

Our Progress Toward a Compostable SunChips Bag

As a child in the early 1950s, I loved to watch a science program on our black and white TV called Watch Mr. Wizard.  I was never very good at science, and eventually turned my career focus to Law and Marketing. 

But, my interest in science still exists. So, I asked Brad Rodgers, Manager for Sustainable Packaging at Frito-Lay, to help explain today’s article in USA Today and the announcement we made about the new SunChips large bag packaging -- which totes a new impressive message in the upper right hand corner: 

"RENEWABLE MATERIALS MAKE UP 33% OF THIS PACKAGE"

I previously wrote how "Packaging Scorecards are Improving," and discussed conventional methods to reduce packaging waste. But I also mentioned that there was a new technology on the horizon that would revolutionize the packaging industry -- and we’re starting to use it in SunChips bags.

"The packaging innovation is based on technology that has been around for thousands of years -- since man first began fermenting barley with yeast to make beer," Brad says.  "Packaging film is made out of carbon.  Today that carbon comes from petroleum, which is a non-renewable resource and is not biodegradable.  The new technology converts plant-based sugar carbon into packaging film, replacing the petroleum.  So, we get the benefit of using a renewable source, carbon, and yielding a compostable result, the new film." Brad said. 

Frito-Lay partnered with Nature Works, who developed the biotechnology and has built a plant in Nebraska to manufacture the plant-based sugar carbon into packaging film, to convert their science into a large-scale commercial application.  And, SunChips is our first product to start using the new film.

Brad explained how 33 percent of the package is compostable by describing the package itself.  Frito-Lay packaging film has three layers -- an outer layer that has the printing on it, an inner layer that keeps the product fresh and a glue layer in-between the two.  Our first step to a fully compostable bag was to convert that outer layer (print layer) into to material made with sugar carbon. 

We’ve spent four years of intense development time working with Nature Works to reach this point," Brad told me. "But now that we’ve achieved the first step, we can move more quickly and to conquer the three remaining steps,” Brad said. 

• First: convert all three layers of the SunChips bag to the new film; and launch a fully compostable bag in 2010;

• Second: ramp-up industry capacity to apply the new technology to the rest of our packaging;

• Third: Find more efficient sources for the sugar, currently made from corn.  For example an acre of sugar cane produces 5-7 times more sugar than an acre of corn does.

You'll see an ad in People Magazinethis month that is a sample of the fully compostable bag, which is set to launch on Earth Day 2010.

I learned a lot from Brad as we discussed the new SunChips packaging. Unlike me, Brad has always been good at science.  While Mr. Wizard was before his time, he admits to being influenced by the movie The Graduate in picking a career as a polymer chemist -- and fondly remembers the one word career advice given to Dustin Hoffman, "plastics."
 
And, Brad’s son is following in his footsteps and studying food science in college, with a focus on agriculture and fermentation.   Maybe someday he'll join Frito-Lay and help us to continue our commitment to conserving and preserving our planet with other new technology breakthroughs. 

View a brief video that illustrates the SunChips compostable bag, coming on Earth Day 2010:

Who Do You Trust?

Yesterday on Greenbiz.com, John Makower posted an article,"Taking Care of Business," that is potentially troublesome, as he states, citing data from a 2008 PriceWaterhouseCoopers report:

"Consumers' trust in environmental claims range from 51 percent for those from nonprofit groups to only 9 percent for those from retailers."

I've been talking on Snack Chat about all of the great things Frito-Lay is doing to conserve and preserve the planet, and we're committed to communicating only information that is accurate and credible, especially when it comes to environmental sustainability. I feel good about the progress Frito-Lay has made in conserving and preserving resources, and that our Snack Chat readers trust Frito-Lay, me and the stories I'm sharing.

So tell me, what makes you trust a company and the information it shares?

Frito-Lay Joins Partnership with Smith Electric Vehicles

Earlier this week, Smith Electric Vehicles (SEV) held a press conference to announce its partnerships with a few industry leaders in which the companies will bring SEV's tried-and-true technologies for environmentally conscious fleet trucks to market. Frito-Lay is proud to be one of the SEV partner companies, along with Ford Motor Co., AT&T and Pacific Gas and Electric. Frito-Lay is buying from SEV all-electric-powered zero-emission delivery vans. The vans are powered by lithium-ion batteries that can be fully recharged in six to eight hours.

View excerpts from the press conference, including a segment featuring Mike O'Connell, Director, National Fleet Capability at Frito-Lay, (starts at 5 min 25 sec mark) and learn more about how Frito-Lay and other companies are making good on our commitments to environmental sustainability through fleet innovations.

Chester Cheetah Grows Up

Andy Warhol, through his famous Campbell's Soup can painting, captured that culture, pop culture and  advertising are all interrelated in America.  And this phenomenon is apparent now more than ever: Consider spokescreatures like the M&M characters, the Energizer Bunny and Frito-Lay's Chester Cheetah, which have all become beloved characters everyone seems to know.

Over the last 20 years I've watched Chester Cheetah's personality evolve.  He used to be the cool kitty who was always trying to get some Cheetos, but never succeeding -- something that appealed to kids.  Today, Cheetos targets adults -- especially 30-year-old men -- and so Chester has grown up.  He's now associating with adults, acting as the catalyst that brings out their inner-most mischievous feelings.

"Young adults today are under a lot of pressure with jobs, children and financial concerns," says Marissa Jarratt, Brand Manager on Cheetos.  "So we want Chester and Cheetos to provide them with a moment of fun – a brief escape from the pressure of daily life." 

The Cheetos team recently won the Grand Ogilvy Award from the Advertising Research Foundation for last year’s campaign, "Orange Underground," which featured Chester encouraging adults to engage in random acts of mischief.  Building on that success, this month, Cheetos launched a new snack, Giant Cheetos, large bites of Cheetos, each about the size of a golf ball.  And, a revamped Web site and new advertising support the innovation.  USA Today even featured Giant Cheetos last week in an article about products that “make people smile.”

Giant Cheetos are available in Cheese and Flamin Hot flavors -- in a large bag and a single-serve sleeve of five balls (only 80 calories for the single-serve sleeve).  I've tried the Cheese Giant Cheetos and each piece presented me with a challenge:  Do I eat it in one or two bites?   I usually go for the two-bite option, but Marissa tells me that most men prefer the one-bite alternative.   

There are two new Cheetos ads featuring Chester that will debut on TV in a few weeks.  You can catch them on late-night programs on networks including Comedy Central, TBS, FX and VH1, since these channels are where young adults hang out after the kids go to bed. 

So now that Chester Cheetah has grown up, I look forward to seeing how his story and the Cheetos brand continues to evolve.  I think the introduction of Giant Cheetos is another step in the right direction.  So, how will you eat Giant Cheetos –- in one bite, or two?