Predicting Lay’s next potato chip flavor with SurveyMonkey Audience

When a company is about to send a new product out into the world, one of the first things they want to know is, “Will people like this?” Sometimes the most effective way to answer this question is to just ask your customers directly. That’s exactly what Lay’s Potato Chips is doing with their Do Us a Flavor contest.

It all began in summer of last year when Lay’s announced a contest asking consumers to submit a flavor–any flavor–to join the Lay’s potato chip family. Over three million consumers sent in their flavor suggestions and from those three million, three flavors made the final cut. Say hello to Cheesy Garlic Bread, Chicken & Waffles, and for those who like it spicy–Sriracha.

The snack brand has left it up to America to choose the next chip flavor; consumers have until May 4th to vote for their favorite of the three on Lay’s Facebook page. The winning consumer creation will earn its flavor inventor a chance to win one million dollars or one percent of the chip’s net 2013 net sales and will also become a permanent part of the Lay’s Potato Chip line-up.

Here at SurveyMonkey Audience, we’re always up for a challenge, so we wanted to use this contest as an opportunity to flex our survey muscles. Can we correctly predict which chip flavor will emerge victorious before Lay’s officially announces the winner on May 5th? Worth a shot!

We asked over 400 Americans which chip flavor out of the three Lay’s finalists sounded the most delicious to them, but we didn’t stop there. We also wanted to know which flavor were they most likely to purchase?

Here’s what we found out…drum-roll, please!

A whopping 52% threw in their votes for Cheesy Garlic Bread compared to 34% who preferred Sriracha. Chicken and Waffles came in last nabbing 13% of the votes.

So we know what flavor chip people will chomp down on but which of the three flavors are they most likely to actually buy?

According to our results, Chicken & Waffles might fare better in a breakfast place than as a lunchtime snack in a bag. A combined 20% of respondents say they’re “Extremely likely” or “Very likely” to buy off the shelf compared to almost half reporting they’re “Not at all likely” to purchase.

Results for Sriracha were almost even with their Chicken & Waffles flavor competitor. 30% of respondents are “extremely to very likely” to buy, with 15% “moderately likely”, and nearly 40% saying they’re definitely taking a pass on the spicy (“Not at all likely”).

So we already learned that Cheesy Garlic Bread sounds the tastiest out of the three flavors but are folks eager to try and buy?

Yep–not only do Cheesy Garlic Bread flavored potato chips sound pretty darn good, a combined 40% say they’re very to extremely likely to buy a bag compared to only 25% who are not at all likely. And there you have it, snack fans! Based off our taste analysis, we believe the creator of Cheesy Garlic Bread is going to take home the Do Us a Flavor prize.

Lay’s—and their parent company, Frito-Lay—have put an incredible amount of effort into this marketing campaign since the summer. We can only assume that Lay’s had greater intentions than just picking the newest flavor, however if we end up making the right flavor prediction, that means SurveyMonkey Audience can help them–or any other consumer brand–get an accurate read on what consumers prefer in a fraction of the time and cost. Pretty amazing!

Now get to snackin’ and don’t forget to vote for your fave flavor.

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