Can Heyday Canning Make Soups Sexy?
Canned soup – it’s comforting. It’s convenient. It’s cost-effective. But can it be sexy?
Heyday Canning Co. is taking on the challenge, aiming to give the sick-day staple a glow-up. Fresh off a TikTok-viral bean-themed pop-up in New York, the California-based startup is continuing its quest to reimagine dusty pantry items for the modern shopper, now with a line of soups, stews and chilis rolling out at Whole Foods Market nationwide exclusively through September.
Like its core line of canned beans, the brand’s spin on soups centers on “bold, unique flavor profiles” and “an unprecedented level of quality” within the segment, as well as its eye-catching, vintage-inspired packaging design, said co-founder and CEO Kat Kavner.
Offerings include Creamy Coconut Corn Chowder, Golden Butternut Lentil Stew, Fire Roasted Sweet Potato Chili, Pinto & Black Bean Mole Chili, Lemon Parmesan Noodle Soup and Grilled Cheese Tomato Soup.
A can retails for $5.99, which Kavner noted is a slight premium when compared to organic rivals Amy’s Kitchen and Pacific Foods but more affordable than other meal options – “In terms of our competitive set, it’s not just the other canned soups or canned beans. It’s frozen food. It’s going out to eat, it’s ordering DoorDash,” she said.
The company’s canned beans – which includes Kimchi Sesame Navy Beans, Apricot Glazed Baked Beans and Harissa Lemon Chickpeas, among others – quickly gained distribution since first landing on Whole Foods’ shelves nationwide early last year. The brand has expanded to additional retailers including Meijer, Fresh Market and Central Market, proving “our hypothesis that … this is a very sleepy category and buyers are looking for something to shake it up,” Kavner said.
Last spring, the teams at Heyday and Whole Foods began noodling on additional canned concepts and “really homed in on soups and chilis and the rough concepts that we shared with them at the time,” Kavner said.
“From day zero, before we incorporated and had anything going, the grand vision was to create a brand that can innovate all the way up and down the canned food aisle,” she added.
Heyday’s lineup riffs on the classics. Rather than a simple tomato soup, its version is pureed with Tillamook Sharp Cheddar and Patagonia Provisions sourdough crackers.
“We’re bringing things to the category that just no other brand has in their lineup. We have some flavors that, even without tasting it, it’s intriguing and kind of makes you excited to try canned soup,” Kavner said.
Upending consumer perceptions of canned goods has been more challenging than expected, particularly with beans, a category largely driven by price and awash with bland commodity products. Heyday’s founders rely on sampling, which tends to produce such reactions as “I didn’t know canned food could taste like this,” Kavner said.
The bean pop-up shop, which opened for several days in December and invited patrons to trade any kind of beans for Heyday products and merchandise, drew a line down the block and thousands of new followers on its social media platforms.
As inflation eases, soup sales are expected to cool, per market researcher Mintel, which forecast total U.S. retail sales at $12.1 billion in 2028. Flavor and price drive purchase decisions in the category; still, soup suffers some perception issues. Only a quarter of consumers view store-bought soup as flavorful, and the category is generally not viewed as healthy, despite more than half of soup shoppers saying they eat it while ill, according to Mintel.
“What we’re building in the brand so far is this really youthful, vibrant energy that you don’t find in the canned food aisle, and hopefully that translates to a lot of incremental users in the category,” Kavner said.
