How Frito-Lay Dominated Snack Foods

Frito-Lay is the company behind most major chip brands, controlling more than half the market. This video talks about how they did it.

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Company Declines:
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[zangcheye]

Back in the 90s, I bought a bag of classic Lay's from a vending machine. It had dead ants in it. In the days before the Internet, I called their 1-800 number to inform them. I wasn't angry or upset - I just wanted to let them know. Five days later I received an entire CASE of Lay's chips as an apology. Great customer service.

[austin]

Probably one of my favorite youtubers to talk about companies. You make it well rounded for someone who may not know as much about how companies function, and make it welcoming. Bravo.

[rogiervansuylekom]

Great company. I worked for them over 15 years ago at the R&D departement. Literally tasting snacks the whole day. And on Fridays you could bring a few bags home. I gained a lot of weight during that time.

[CI]

Working at Walmart, it always fascinated me how much dedicated space in the back room Frito-Lay has. This actually explained a lot to me. Fair enough!

[Rachara]

One of the coolest things about Fritos is the ingredient list:

Corn, Corn Oil, Salt.

[russel]

I remember first getting hired by Frito Lay and realizing just how big the company was and how many products they stocked. It was insane. The Walmart I serviced had about 40 feet of product on the shelf

[alexhoberg]

You're consistently one of my favorite creators and this video is a prime example why. Clear, detailed, good tangents. Most importantly you make something that could be "boring" fun and entertaining. Love it

[IAsimov]

I'm mexican living in Mexico, and Frito Bandito is *awesome*.

[YeahAlright]

As a Mexican i can confirm that we consume 80% or more of the Hot Cheetos produced. I started eating them at the age of 2 😂

[genesorianoautor]

I love how this fellow can make something as simple as chips seem so compelling.

[prod]

As a Mexican American I can confirm Frito Bandito is 🔥🔥🔥

[brendennichols]

I worked 12 years for Frito lay as a Potato chip processing cook/Opertor I was part of the whole process from reviving in raw potato’s all the way to finished product.

[jeremyricker]

Great job! I've been working for frito-lay for 5 years. I work on the trucks. Interesting info is to say we're merging more and more into PepsiCo. Also we buy up smaller companies. Popcorners, crackerjack, quaker, etc. That's how PepsiCo has dominated.

[PhredsArmy]

Believe its or not, my nickname in elementary school was the "Frito Bandito". I have a hispanic last name, but that wasn't why. My mother always included a bag of Fritos in my lunch, and Fritos were really popular at the time with the bandito commercial on the TV, so the name stuck.

[bloqk]

I love the Doritos products and Cheetos. The one issue I have with Frito-Lay is with the re-branding of the shrinking packages the chips comes in.
What is considered today as the _jumbo_ "Party Size" package, used to be, decades ago, the _regular_ sized package the chips came in.

[JuniperArcher]

When I went to England, I found out that Cool Ranch flavor comes in a different colored bag (cyan blue instead of dark blue) and that they are called Cool American. I wouldn't shut up about it for a month, thats so funny. I never thought about Ranch being a distinctly American flavor before that. I also miss Cheeto Twists sooo much!! They were huge and awesome and such a fun shape. Purple bag too :)

[jthomashair]

Frito-Lay was banned in my household growing up because they used their size and legal muscle to bankrupt my grandfather and force him out of business. My grandfather had a competitor business that was doing very well with a new way of processing corn for corn chips. He had just become a millionaire overnight in his 20s.

Frito-Lay sued him, claiming that he obtained this process with insider information from his ex-father in law who still worked for Frito Lay. They also fired the father-in law. It was bullshit, or so the family story goes. My grandfather hated his jerk of a father in law and did not keep in touch with him, let alone collude with him. Frito-Lay used that connection to justify their lawsuit. They kept throwing money at it until my grandfather couldn’t afford to fight to the lawsuit anymore and was forced to dissolve his company. The next year, Frito-Lay started using the very same corn chip technique he invented.

Our family ended up okay anyways, but it’s crazy to think we could have been millionaires with a family business if Frito-Lay wasn’t so ruthless in the early days of their ascent to market dominance.

[jasonallen]

Cheeto puffs are my favorite nowadays with a sandwich, but when I was a kid, cool ranch and hot flames were tied for first, with a bag each of Vintners salt and sour and cheese potatoe chips (Chips were 25 cents a bag then and I even remember in the 80s when they were 15 cents)😊

[elliottryan]

DUDE! Your videos are just outstanding. They are so original, informative, and family friendly, and I could go on forever. Keep up the GREAT work.

[aolifestyle]

I’ve been working for Frito Lay for about a year now as a merchandiser and so far I can’t complain much it’s a great company with a very hands off approach on their employees. Only complaint would be their management organization and how they sometimes can be very oblivious to how it is to be the ones stocking and the timing. Otherwise it’s fun to sometimes get a lot of free chips and try the new and limited edition snacks. Also are very competitive in pay which is always a plus. Also I was waiting on this video since I was hoping you went into Frito Lay in the PepsiCo video haha. Great video as always!