Which Hip-Hop Artist Deserves Their Own “Rap Snacks” Flavor?

Since the brand’s relaunch in 2016, you’re sure to have caught a bag of Rap Snacks in your peripheral vision at self checkouts everywhere. The licensed snack brand is known for partnering with popular rappers, creating fun flavor combinations packaged with insider references for fans. You probably never picked them up yourself, but they’re well seasoned and make for a great gag gift or accessory to the VLONE.

Merchandised at the front of groceries and gas stations, with crisp, eye-catching packaging that features an image of a selected rapper and a food pun relevant to their music, Rap Snacks are typically positioned as an impulse purchase for anyone who recognizes the artist on the bag.

With this business model, Rap Snacks has just barely pierced the zeitgeist of both the hip-hop and snack worlds. Here, I’d like to take a look at the brand’s history, current position in the market, and some ideas for future collaborations.

Rap Snacks’ core product is of course single serving bags of chips, but they also offer lines of ramen, gummies, honey buns, cheese puffs, pork skins, lemonade, and historically many other nostalgic “hood snacks”. The types of snacks and number of flavors each collaborating artist offers is dependent on lots of behind the scenes factors – likely based on their agreements and what retailers are interested in carrying.

These facts, combined with the brand’s scattered history, makes it difficult to compile an exhaustive list of collaborators, flavors, or current offerings; that being said, below is a selection of the brands’ license history and notable flavors:

With collaborators like these, drama, success and history are sure to be made. This includes founder James Lindsay’s time as Meek Mill’s manager, or Rap Snacks’ 2010 partnership with Master P’s son Lil Romeo. Romeo is an artist in his own right, but perhaps his greatest claim to fame is his contribution to the savory snack scene, claiming in 2015, “Besides the brand name and the artists on the bag, I was the first person to create a honey barbecue potato chip”.

On the subject of honey barbecue, Rap Snacks had a spat with relaunch headliner Fetty Wap. Per Linday, “Wap wanted the honey barbecue by itself, he didn’t want Honey Jalapeño. Now he loves that flavor too. It’s like, guys, you perform, this is what I do. Let me do what I do, I won’t let you down”. A testament to the brands’ proactive flavor development.

Culturally, they must have also had a reputation at the forefront in hip-hop marketing. This would have come even before 50 and Vitamin Water, back to the Sprite days. But Rap Snacks would of course have their ear closer to the streets, with a Southern bias for the hard-hitting and crass. Just look at the types of artists listed earlier: Pastor Troy? Boosie? This was only further engrained in their identity after being acquired by the No Limit family.

Now I’d like to take a moment to thank this article’s sponsors: Rap Snacks!

Looking forward, Rap Snacks will need to find a balance between that tapped-in ethos and a streaming-era friendly approach for an ultra consumerist 2020’s onward. Which artists should they be targeting for collaborations, based on their current demographics’ music taste and white space based around their styles? What gaps remain are in their flavor lineup?

Well, I’ve compiled a rough brainstorm of artists that would make sense to work with, across varying subgenres and popularity levels. I gotta give a disclaimer that this wasn’t easy, since most rappers talk about their beverages more so than food!

Action Bronson – Bomb Baklava, Gyro

The Fuck That’s Delicious host’s music is full of references to fine Mediterranean cooking. Gyro is an underexplored meat flavor, but they could opt for a salty and sweet mixture like Baklava as well.

Bad Bunny – Super Salsa, Chamoy

Possibly the biggest artist in the world today, a partnership with Bad Bunny would be massive for any brand. If pitched and marketed tactfully, he could be had. Fresh off a Super Bowl Halftime performance, Super Salsa would be an obvious choice; but for a more authentically Latin export, chamoy seems to be a uptrending flavor.

Sahbabii – Squidtacular Calamari

Sahbabii might not be a hosuehold name, but his cultlike following of off-the-wall melodic trap fans has grown significantly in recent years. Seafood isn’t a common flavor among chips, but I can imagine it being good and salty, too obvious a crossover to pass up.

Benny – Hot Buffalo

A marketing opportunity for Rap Snacks might be to launch regional flavors that are either limited to that area, or are marketed as state sponsored gimmicks. This might give them a chance to break away from all Southern rappers, with underground mainstays like Benny the Butcher. The only thing more Buffalo than Griselda is hot wings – my favorite flavor.

Eminem – Mom’s Spaghetti

Maybe the most meme-d food bar in all of hip-hop, Eminem has leaned into the “Lose Yourself” iconography himself, with a history of jokes and his own restaurant in Detroit. There aren’t many bigger names you could work with in pop culture.

Cypress Hill – Cypress Sour Cream & Onion

Among the most merchandised old school rappers are Cypress Hill. You gotta have a safe bet like them in your lineup, while sour cream and onion is an essential flavor for any chip brand. Plus, you could frame it that they’re smoking on onions.

P Diddy – Dill pickle

It’s too engrained in today’s humor. Plus, he might need the royalties.

Drake – Poutine Party

Another star too massively obvious not to reach out to is Aubrey Graham himself. There are so many potential flavors and jokes relevant to his character and discography, that you have to choose the safest, most exciting Canadian export.

I hope that somebody from Rap Snacks took the time to read and consider this. Please hire me. This was not AI. With the above artists and flavor families, or at least some from a similar line of thinking, you could reenter the spotlight of the impulse snack and hip-hop worlds as a mainstay brand that labels revere.

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