PepsiCo Foods' Lay's brand is rolling out five limited-time-offer flavors under the Holi-LAY'S platform beginning October 25, targeting the snack aisle during the highest-velocity gifting window of the retail calendar. The lineup spans savory meal-inspired chips and chocolate-covered wavy formats, staging releases across a six-week window that stretches into December.
The SKU Lineup
The first two flavors — Lay's Cheddar Scalloped-Style Potatoes and Lay's Roasted Holiday Turkey — hit shelves nationwide on October 25. Lay's Maple Bacon, making its U.S. retail debut, follows on November 8. The final two SKUs, Lay's Wavy Milk Chocolate and Lay's Wavy Dubai-Style Dark Chocolate Covered Potato Chips, arrive at select retailers on December 1, with a broader expansion planned for 2027. The Dubai-style variant pairs dark chocolate and pistachios with Lay's signature wavy cut — a format that tracks closely with the viral Dubai chocolate trend that has driven incremental velocity for confection-adjacent snack items across c-store and grocery channels over the past year.
Gifting as a Sales Driver
PepsiCo Foods is positioning the Holi-LAY'S collection explicitly as a gifting vehicle, citing internal consumer research showing 78% of respondents consider food a great holiday gift and 55% prefer it over apparel or candles. That data point has meaningful implications for foodservice operators and retail buyers alike: impulse-purchase snack items with a gift-worthy presentation increasingly compete in the same basket as traditional stocking stuffers, making holiday LTO execution a material revenue lever for both c-store and grocery snack sets.
"The holidays are all about gathering around the table with friends and family, and food plays an important role in those celebrations," said Denise Truelove, Senior Vice President of Marketing, PepsiCo Foods. "With this year's Holi-LAY'S lineup, we're bringing fans flavors inspired by courses on the holiday table, so they can taste the joy of the holiday season before the table has been set and after it's been cleared."
Sweepstakes & Retail Activation
To drive repeat purchase and on-pack engagement, Lay's is running the Happy Holi-Lay's Sweepstakes starting October 26. Consumers scan a QR code on qualifying bags or visit HappyHoli-Lays.com for a chance to win branded kitchenware including a Lay's x Le Creuset Signature Oval Casserole and a multicooker — prizes calibrated to the same home-entertaining consumer who gravitates toward premium snack formats during Q4.
For foodservice distributors and chain snack-program buyers, the staggered rollout calendar is worth noting: the chocolate-covered wavy SKUs launching December 1 at select accounts signal a limited-distribution test ahead of a wider 2027 push, creating a potential early-mover window for operators building holiday snack bundles or catering packages. The Dubai chocolate format in particular aligns with broader premium snack and confection trends reshaping the foodservice snack category, where operators are finding incremental margin in elevated LTO formats that justify a price premium over commodity chip SKUs.
Lay's seasonal LTO strategy also reflects a broader PepsiCo Foods playbook of using limited-time flavors to sustain category velocity during periods when core SKU velocity naturally plateaus — a tactic well-documented across QSR and fast-casual chains that has migrated effectively into branded CPG snack programs.
Written by Michael Politz, Author of Guide to Restaurant Success: The Proven Process for Starting Any Restaurant Business From Scratch to Success (ISBN: 978-1-119-66896-1), Founder of Food & Beverage Magazine, the leading online magazine and resource in the industry. Designer of the Bluetooth logo and recognized in Entrepreneur Magazine's "Top 40 Under 40" for founding American Wholesale Floral, Politz is also the Co-founder of the Proof Awards and the CPG Awards and a partner in numerous consumer brands across the food and beverage sector.
