What consumers like in their salty snacks, straight from Zappi’s Normative Data Agent

While consumer data is everywhere, it’s not always easy to connect the dots, and that can leave ideas feeling out of step with both consumers and the market. 

But once you have a body of research covering multiple innovations, you have the opportunity to connect those insights to learn even more about what works and what doesn’t for your brand and your category. 

AI makes surfacing those insights easier than ever before. And now, you can get direct access to those insights with our Activate It Normative Data Agent. 

This new agent, part of our AI Concept Creation Agents ecosystem, lets teams jumpstart their idea generation by surfacing insights on what’s worked and what hasn't in their category.

Here’s what we pulled from the Activate It Normative Data Agent in just a few minutes on the US salty snacks category. 

TL;DR

• Overall, the US salty snacks market is driven by classic, familiar flavors and ingredients — especially cheese and savory profiles — paired with simple, transparent ingredient claims. 

• There is a notable consumer shift away from more adventurous (spicy, tangy, lime) snacks. 

• This suggests that innovation should focus on amplifying familiar, high-quality ingredients and taste experiences rather than pushing into less familiar territory.

To unpack all of this, we asked the Normative Data Agent to tell us which factors (taste profile, ingredients, preferred flavors and health and nutrition claims) over and under-index in our database. 

The metric we’re looking at is the average of "trial" and "breakthrough" for each concept (for a more detailed explanation of these metrics, check out this blog). 

The uplift or drop is the difference between the average score for concepts with a given tag and the overall average for all salty snack concepts in the US for the last year in our database.

Salty and savory win in taste

Perhaps unsurprisingly, consumers seem to prefer salty snacks over other taste profiles in their salty snacks! But it’s not just the saltiness — savory snacks in general have a leg up on sweet snacks. 

Spicy and tangy profiles have a noticeable negative impact on trial and breakthrough potential — with a more pronounced negative impact for women (-7% and -6%) and older consumers (-11% and -10%). 

Potatoes are popular, with plant-based proteins showing promise

Potato-based concepts overperform overall (+4%) and with all groups, performing most strongly with older consumers (+9%). 

Plant-based proteins overperform slightly overall (+1%), with a greater lift for women and consumers aged 36-55 (+2%). 

Corn has a slight negative impact on trial and breakthrough potential.

Cheese reigns, lime is a turnoff

Cheese dominates as a favorite flavor across groups, particularly women (+5%), ages 36-55 (+4%) and ages 56-75 (+7%).

Sea salt, peanut butter and chocolate also have a positive impact. 

Tomato basil has a negative impact for men (-2%), but a positive one for women (+5%) and older consumers (+6%). 

And chili and lime both underperform for all groups, particularly women and consumers over 35. 

All health & nutrition claims are useful, particularly with older consumers

Finally, all of the health and nutrition claims we looked at show a positive impact on trial and breakthrough potential overall, with only minor negative impacts among some groups.

“Made with real ingredients,” “free from artificial additives,” “wholesome,” “natural ingredients” and “whole grains” are some of the most overperforming claims — suggesting that consumers are increasingly attentive to ingredient quality and transparency.

“Good source of fiber,” “supports digestive health” and “high protein” overperform slightly overall, but are stronger with older consumers. 

In fact, every one of these health claims performs more strongly with older consumers aged 56-75.

Overall, the data shows us that these are the high-level trends in the salty snacks category: 

• Familiarity and comfort: The US salty snacks market is driven by familiar, comforting flavors (especially cheese and savory) and classic snacking occasions. Consumers are less receptive to adventurous or bold flavor innovations in this category.

• Ingredient transparency: There is a clear trend towards ingredient transparency and health, with consumers rewarding products that highlight real, wholesome and nutritious ingredients.

• Age-driven health focus: As consumers age, their preference for health and nutrition claims grows stronger, suggesting that "better for you" salty snacks have particular appeal for older adults.

• Risk of over-innovation: Overly adventurous flavors or unfamiliar formats (spicy, tangy, lime, certain shapes) are unlikely to have broad appeal. But women and older consumers seem more open to certain flavors (like tomato basil) and ingredients (like plant-based proteins).