Potato Chip Summer

September 1, 2025

Editorial Illustration by Katie Kosma

While most chase complex positioning strategies, the most successful brands often win on simple, holistic audience appeal. 

In 2025 these disruptors identify one small angle of simple pleasure and expand it systemically. Their brands make life better. They’re easy, functional and obvious lifestyle enhancements.

Take the potato chip. Loved by all ages, all genders, all geographic regions, a chip is seasonless, perfect for any and all events, both high- and low-brow. A topping as well as a side. Hell, add caviar and you’ve got an entree!

Besides the few if any barriers to entry, the nostalgia — and I’d argue the unwavering lasting (growing?) brand equity — of the potato chip is unmatched. 

Saying you don’t like potato chips is like saying you don’t like water. 

Americans consume over 1.85 billion pounds of them per year. Beyond being a great BBQ add, the most profitable chip brands have proven clear strategy is the secret ingredient to lasting brand growth in a saturated market. 

Maybe you grabbed a bag of Enso chips touting longevity while browsing The Row ready-to-wear pieces in Amagansett. The Enso brand team is smart because they are effortlessly aligning with an already familiar product (the chip) and then building on that with of-the-moment societal desires (the absence of seed oil). 

If you don’t know about Charles Chips, they’ve cornered the snack-in-a-tin gift market. They’ve taken a familiar product and given you more of it. In unexpected packaging. They identified the angle of delight and expanded on it, made it special. 

Then there is the G.O.A.T. of the market category. Since being founded not that long ago in 1980, the Cape Cod potato chip brand has increased its sales by $384 million. In 2017 Campbell’s Soup bought their parent company for $4.87 billion cash. That’s a lot of bags of chips.

Despite the fierce regional loyalty to local chip brands that many of you have, Cape Cod reigns supreme as both a product and a brand. 

Let’s decode Cape Cod’s marketing strategy. 

Product Consistency Builds Trust

We can all agree Cape Cod’s crunch is paramount in a chip and a trait that has become synonymous with the brand. We love the folds, we love the saltiness, we love the curious ability of such a small surface area to hold such a large amount of dip. This is delivered in every bag. 

Nostalgia Wins over Trending Audio

The red Nauset Lighthouse, approachable-yet-iconic navy logotype serif, the unmistakable tactile feeling of quality when you grab a bag off the grocery shelf — it’s all part of the experience, they are telling the story of their brand, layering in nostalgia through these intentional visual decisions. Whatever Cape Cod is selling (in this case, potato chips), I’m buying. 

How It’s Made Still Matters

“Kettle-cooked” in small batches differentiates Cape Cod from other conveyor-fried chips. The care emphasizes the premium quality. Weaving this creation process transparency into brand messaging and storytelling makes us believe in them. And that trust is non-negotiable when it comes to Gen Z.

Maybe the wicked success of the brand strategy is why Cape Cod must feel like they don’t need to allocate any more chip budget to creative. Speaking on the visual touchpoints — the photography is unappetizing, the site typography is both clunky and hard-to-read, the UGC content forced. One could argue this meh approach to visual brand could read charming, blanding when backed by trust and equity creates a very low barrier to entry for the consumer. The creative could be working harder.

Without losing the plot, the missed opportunity on creative deliverables outside of the brand identity simply shows there is space to elevate that visual language to match the timeless cult strategy and ensure Cape Cod can continue to compete with the Enso’s of today. Get you a summer girl who can do both, Cape Cod.

BEST is available and open to working for trade. 

Through work that’s both deeply conceptual and strategically effective, we make brands central to the conversations their audiences are already having — because relevance yields business growth.

 Call us if you’re looking to make your brand the Cape Cod of your category.