/PRZWT/GUANGZHOU, October 09, 2024 - In China's snack food world, rice has always been the main character on the tongue in different ways.
Rice cakes, fried rice, rice candy, kangolo, rice pot, rice hair cake, rice noodle steamed cake... People have created many rice-based snacks, satisfying the taste buds of generations in countless times of greed and hunger. In the childhood memories of the post-80s and post-90s, the crispy and sweet rice cakes often become a snack option for holiday outings, casual gatherings, and to satisfy cravings and fullness.
However, with the rise of the healthy eating trend, the traditional rice cake snacks with complex ingredient lists and sweet and greasy taste have gradually been neglected. On the eve of the National Day, Lay's launched a new product called "Fresh Baked Naked Rice Cake", which changed the complex ingredients of the previous rice cake products. With simple ingredients and natural taste, it once again aroused the preference of snack lovers for rice cakes.
Targeting new opportunities in old markets
In recent years, with the improvement of consumer quality demand, health has become the pursuit of people, especially mainstream young consumers. In the consumption of leisure snacks, consumers tend to prefer products with cleaner ingredient lists in the same category and price range.
Magic Mirror Insight's "2024 Leisure Snack Market Trend Insight Report" shows that "0 additives" have become the focus of most consumers when purchasing food. More than half of the respondents value "real materials" and "fresh ingredients" when purchasing products. Consumers expect to return to nature, taste the original taste of ingredients and obtain nutrition.
Based on this new consumer trend insight, Lay's Food Research Institute has developed and launched "Fresh Baked Naked Rice Cake", focusing on "6 Major 0 Additions". No cane sugar, monosodium glutamate, sweeteners, leavening agents, gelatin and food flavors are added in the production process to meet consumers' demand for a simpler ingredient list.
Of course, rolling into the old market of rice cakes also includes Lay's research and anticipation of market size and market pain points. From the perspective of market size, the "Global Rice Cake Market Report 2023-2029" shows that the global rice cake market size is expected to reach $8.20 billion in 2029, with a compound annual growth rate of 2.9% in the next few years.
From the perspective of market pain points, in addition to new healthy and quality consumer demand, traditional brands have been developing for decades, but the pace of product iteration and innovation has been slow, which has also left ample opportunity for Lay's to enter the rice cake category.
How to add 0 to ensure delicious food
From the perspective of the ingredient list of the product, Lay's Fresh Baked Naked Rice Cake can be described as simple - rice, oil (containing tea polyphenols), starch and salt, which also made Lay's Fresh Baked Naked Rice Cake the first to absorb powder once it was launched. "Ingredient List Party".
However, Lay's rice cake focuses on "6 big 0 additions". How to make it delicious? At this point, Lay's has exerted its profound Product Research & Development skills. In order to make consumers "eat well" and "delicious", Lay's Food Research Institute uses Northeast Chinese rice to ensure that the amount of rice is not less than 74%. At the same time, innovative processes are used to stimulate the sweet and natural taste of the ingredients without adding cane sugar, so that the rice cake has both a rich rice aroma and a burnt and crispy taste.
Fresh baked naked rice cakes have been widely praised in just half a month. In the comment area of the e-commerce platform and on the social media platform, netizens have left messages expressing their love: "The taste is crisp" "No sugar is added but there is a faint sweetness" "It's so delicious that I can't stop"...
A long-time innovator of new Chinese snacks
In fact, Lay's entry into the rice cake track has long been foreshadowed.
After taking a closer look at Lay's past localized product strategy based on China, it is not difficult to find that the launch of new rice cakes is in fact in line with its approach of taking root in China's localized market demand in recent years and continuously accelerating the innovation of raw materials and flavors.
For example, since 2020, Lay's has launched a regional limited flavor series of potato chips for five consecutive years, and this year it has significantly expanded its capacity to release five new products at one time, including the magnificent Guangxi snail powder flavor, Guizhou Zunyi mutton powder flavor, Qilu Shandong pancake roll green onion flavor, Hebei Shijiazhuang beef plate noodle flavor, and the three northeastern provinces stick bone stewed sauerkraut flavor.
These snacks aimed at China's regional characteristics and food culture characteristics can become explosive Internet celebrity snacks almost every time they are launched, and also bring new possibilities for the development of Lay's Chinese market.
In terms of grasping the trend of consumer demand, Lay's has also been exploring. From these market and product strategies, Lay's, as the "top student" in the casual snack industry, has become a long-term innovator and explorer of new Chinese snacks. The launch of Lay's fresh baked naked rice cakes may add another explosive item to consumers' "Lay's must-buy list".
