PepsiCo tries to woo women with gender-biased snacks

Posted Feb 20th 2009 2:00PM by Elizabeth Harrow
Filed under: Launches, Rants and Raves, PepsiCo (PEP)

The women's movement is an uphill battle of Sisyphean proportions, with every step forward (the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act) quickly negated by five steps back (the movie Bride Wars). I've been a feminist since I was old enough to be argumentative, but I'm having trouble wrapping my head around the latest move by PepsiCo Inc. (NYSE: PEP). The parent company of Fritos, Doritos, and Lay's announced Thursday that it's launching its first snack food targeted specifically toward women. Uhh ... progress?

So, if Pepsi is right, the answer to Sigmund Freud's famous query, "What do women want?" is, "Popcorn." Seriously. The company plans to debut its new Smartfood popcorn clusters in March. The snack combines salty flavors with sweet, and -- prepare to be not at all shocked -- the popcorn clusters are low-calorie. You know, because we're all on diets and we hate our thighs.

Even better, these lo-cal clusters have no artificial colors, flavors, or preservatives, and they come conveniently wrapped in 120-calorie portions. Subtle, Pepsi. Very subtle.

The food firm anticipates that it can rake in about $650 million in additional sales to women, noting that females tend to snack more often than men. (Pepsi's research did not mention whether we snack more simply because our only options are 100-calorie rations of cardboard-textured foodstuffs.)

Sarcasm aside, I'm slightly disappointed with Pepsi right now. I like the company, I like the stock, and I really like CEO Indra Nooyi -- who just happens to be female. However, this new just-for-us-gals snack launch smacks of traditional gender stereotypes. Maybe I'm rare, but I personally have a serious aversion to anything labeled as "low-calorie."

Anyway, blame it on my womanly hormones, but I can't help feeling marginalized. By a snack food. And if we can't take back the snack aisle, how are we ever going to take back the night?

Elizabeth Harrow is an analyst and financial writer in the research department at Schaeffer's Investment Research. She is featured in the video series Schaeffer's Daily Q&A on SchaeffersResearch.com.

Tags: feminism, indra nooyi, IndraNooyi, inthenews, pep, pepsico, smartfood, snacks