The US food and beverages giant said it has taken inspiration from hand-made and home-dried crunchy ‘papad’ that is widely consumed with rice and rasam, dal or sambhar. The new product under its Lay’s brand has been launched in Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, and Kerala. Lay’s has always been at the forefront of innovating with new formats and variants and our regionalization strategy is a demonstration of our efforts to build a closer connection with our consumers.
With this launch, we take a further step by identifying everyday meal occasions as per regions and coming with a product that compliments the existing tastes and palates. The company said it is constantly transforming its snacks portfolio to expand its consumer base and south India is a key market for its foods business.
PepsiCo is the second largest snacks maker in the country after Haldiram, but it has a leadership position in the southern region. The south has always been a large market for unbranded papadam or appalam, served as a complement to lunch or dinner. Despite having strong R&D capabilities, Pepsi has not been able to crack the Indian namkeen market owing to the high level of regional preference and taste.
