Lo-Cal Trumps Keto in New Biena Chip Line

Snack brand Biena Foods is looking to go after calorie conscious shoppers, launching a new line called Tasty Thins.

“Our mission has always been to reinvent the snack aisle,” Biena founder and CEO Poorvi Patodia said. “[It] gives us permission to really go anywhere where we think that there’s an opportunity to actually offer a better solution.”

Available in Hawaiian Barbeque, Sea Salt and Tuscan Herb flavors, each 4 oz. bag of Thins retails for $4.99. The line, launched last week, will be sold in Walmart, Whole Foods Market, Wegmans and Stop & Shop in the coming months.

Previous Biena products have emphasized their high-protein or low carbohydrate nature, but the Tasty Thins focus on one thing: calories, which total 140 calories per 35 crisps. Though a serving of pita chips, tortilla chips and crackers, is also 28 grams and often around 140-180 calories, typically consumers feel like it’s a smaller portion because they can only consume seven to 15 chips, according to Patodia.

“When you look at what it is that [consumers are] looking for in the foods that they’re eating, it’s actually really, really, really simple,” Patodia emphasized. “One is they’re looking for easy ways to consume more veggies, [and then], the vast majority of people are still looking at calories.”

The concept was developed after Biena conducted research and found that at any given time 53% of shoppers claim they are on a diet, with calorie counting the most common dietary trend. Patodia said the focus on low calorie will “broaden the equity of the brand …to enlarg[e] the circle,” and allows Biena to go after brands such as SkinnyPop or Wheat Thins, which have verbal cues in their names to target low calorie snackers.

Brands such as Love Good Fats, Magic Spoon and Fat Snax all have also widened their own positioning from “keto” to broader health and wellness terminology. According to a 2021 study by the Food Industry Association and the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics Foundation, 25% of shoppers look for low calorie food options when making a purchase. Meanwhile, according to media firm Catalina, sales of low calorie/reduced fat snacks increased 20% over the course of last summer.