General Mills has carved out an enviable niche as a market leader in cereal. Now, the 160-year-old food giant is trying to make inroads in salty snacks by revamping brands like Chex Mix and Bugles.
The company has spent the last year aggressively boosting the flavor profiles of its brands to help them stand out. General Mills is also offering new packaging formats to ensure their products are conducive to different eating occasions, including family gatherings and on-the-go. Innovations to Bugles are expected to reach the market in 2027.
The company’s salty snack changes so far are paying off, with sales up 5.2% during the last four quarters in a snacking category that is essentially flat, said Ben Irby, president of General Mills’ snacks business. The company’s salty snacks are now in nearly 16% of U.S. households from about 14% a year ago, and the business is growing dollar and volume share for General Mills.
“All of a sudden, we can now compete with some of the big players,” Irby said following the recent innovation. “[Our team] has shown a little bit of an underdog mentality. People can underestimate us but I think the growth we’ve driven in the last year is one of the reasons there’s a lot more to go in this business.”
Despite the progress, General Mills holds about a tiny 1% share of the $32 billion salty snacks space, trailing leader PepsiCo’s roughly 50%. Salty snacks are also responsible for a small portion of General Mills’ overall business, totaling $760 million of the company’s $18.4 billion in sales during its fiscal 2026 year.
General Mills’ moved to refresh its salty snacks business a few years ago after executives conducted taste tests comparing the company's salty snack brands to its competitors and found that the results “were not great,” Irby said.
Some snacks were similar to competitors as far as flavor and packaging when they should be outperforming, while others were similar or even slightly behind in categories where General Mills was aiming for parity or better.
For Chex Mix, consumers weren’t requesting product improvements, but the head-to-head tests showed that the brand wasn’t going to stand out from other snacks without some improvements, Irby said.
"The team stepped back and they brought to me this challenge of, ‘This is not good enough, and it will take an investment to get this to where we need to be,'” the executive recalled. “Until we have a better product, winning in this space is going to be impossible.”
General Mills went about overhauling Chex Mix’s top three offerings — original, cheesy and bold — to amp up the flavor with the addition of so-called “hero” pieces that are double-coated in flavor and interspersed throughout the snack. General Mills also refreshed Chex Mix’ packaging to highlight the hero pieces and launched a resealable tub.
Since the flavor boost and packaging renovations reached shelves a year ago, Chex Mix’s retail sales have surged 19%, according to the company. The brand is also being consumed more often in homes with children, a key foundation for Chex Mix’s future.
General Mills has continued to step up innovation for the brand in 2026. It tapped into consumer interest in salty-sweet snacks by launching in convenience stores a version of Chex Mix with M&Ms, the top new salty snack item in the channel in the first half of the year, the company said.
The food manufacturer also introduced tubs for Chex Mix and Gardetto’s, another savory snack mix, to meet consumer demand for resealable, fresh and larger family sizes. And Gardetto’s rolled out a honey mustard flavor to tap into consumer interest and double down on the brand’s premium perception.
As General Mills works on its snack offerings, Irby said he carefully watches people during meetings to see which snacks people go back for seconds for, which ones are taken home and which ones run out in the office. He’s even a Chex Mix convert.
“I will tell you I didn't eat a ton of Chex Mix before this flavor renovation,” Irby confessed. “I eat a lot more of it now, but you know in salty snacking, if you don't win on taste, I mean this is the ultimate discretionary category.”
