The months following the holidays can be long and dull, leaving Americans in search of good times. To beat the occasional winter blues, they rely on simple pleasures like snack food, says the Snack Food Association (SFA) and the National Potato Promotion Board (NPPB). In a recent nationwide survey, respondents said that to boost their spirits during the winter months, they most like to do the following things:
1. watch an old movie on TV (53 percent)
2. eat a favorite snack food (45 percent)
3. call an old friend (45 percent)
4. reread a favorite book (35 percent)
5. bake cookies (34 percent)
The popularity of snacks in the winter has been evident for years in annual Super Bowl celebrations. Sure, the big game is popular, too, but according to SFA, Super Bowl Sunday is the largest snacking occasion of the year. On game day last year, Americans consumed an amazing 10.8 million pounds of potato chips-including plenty of no- and low-fat chips, which are leading segment growth sales with an increase of 32 percent in supermarket sales since 1995.
To keep spirits high after the Super Bowl, SFA and NPPB declared February National Snack Food Month in 1989. Last year during National Snack Food Month, Americans ate 453 million pounds of potato chips, pretzels, meat snacks and other salty treats.
"Now in our tenth annual National Snack Food Month celebration, we're finding that Americans are celebrating now more than ever," said Andreas Walter, manager of communications at SFA. "What we're snacking on may be changing, but snack consumption continues to rise every February."
With low- and no-fat potato chips now representing 11 percent of total supermarket sales, Walter said it's evident consumers are looking for low-fat choices. That may be the reason more are buying meat snacks-which are naturally low-fat. Meat snacks' 1996 pound volume has increased by 3.2 percent and has been going up steadily since 1991 for a total increase of 72 percent.
The Snack Food Association is an international trade association of the more than 800 member companies that represent snack manufacturers and suppliers to the snack food industry. Snacks produced and sold by SFA members include potato chips, corn chips, tortilla chips, pretzels, popcorn, pork rinds, snack nuts, extruded snacks, dried meat snacks, multigrain chips, bite-size crackers, cracker sandwiches, filled products, party mix, trail mix, bagel chips, fruit snacks, snack pickles, dips and dip mixes. The National Potato Promotion Board represents potato growers nationwide.
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