Love You Foods, LLC, the makers of FBOMB (the ‘F’ stands for ‘fat’), has redesigned the top of its nut butter packages with a tapered tear-off opening, and changed the portion size from 1.25-ounces to 1-ounce, meant for a convenient and simple snacking experience. Other players on the market with similarly portioned products typically have wider openings and are made with thinner packaging material.
FBOMB engineered a three-layer, extra-durable funnel-shaped pouch to differentiate itself from the competition.
“If you look at all the nut butters, they all are in just a good ole’ rectangular pouch,” FBOMB chief market officer Todd Cantrell told FoodNavigator-USA.
“These products are high in oil. Because of the fat content it can become a hot mess, real quick.”
Currently available online (through FBOMB's website and Amazon) in cases of 10 pouches for $24.99 and packs of four for $12.99, Cantrell said the company is in talks with national drug and grocery retailers to get into brick and mortars, a priority for this year.
Its flavors include macadamia with sea salt, macadamia with coconut, salted chocolate macadamia, and macadamia pecan with sea salt.
Because of its market positioning as an on-the-go snack, FBOMB sees itself as more of a bar alternative than simply another nut butter packaging format.
“In grocery, being in the nut butter section is fine, but we’d actually like to be over where the bars are because we feel that that’s even more of an alternative to all the carb-laden bars,” Cantrell said.
"Like any entrepreneurial endeavor it was born out of necessity. If you go through especially an airport and try to find a high fat, low carb type of snack to take on a plane with you, it’s pretty much impossible," FBOMB chief marketing officer, Todd Cantrell, said.
"The pure genesis for this product was on-the-go, and of course if you’re typically mobile and moving, you’re not going to have a jar with you."
Macadamia nuts put the ‘F’ in FBOMB
The nut butter category has seen its fair share of peanut, almond, and cashew products, but FBOMB chose macadamia nuts because of their higher fat content – 76 grams of fat per 100 grams of macadamia compared to 51 grams in almonds and 15 grams in cashews, according to Cantrell.
To be more specific, macadamia nuts contain high levels of monunstaturated fat (the same kind found in avocados and olive oil) and some studies have found it to have an anti-inflammatory effect.
“The macadamia is a very fat dense nut so that was the basis for the formulation,” Cantrell said. “It’s just the best way to get the highest fat macros – that’s the objective of FBOMB.”
Cantrell added that its production process begins with dry roasting macadamia nuts from California and that its finished products are not supplemented with any other nuts.
“If you look at a lot of the formulas out there, a lot of the players use lower cost nuts to keep their costs down and basically make more money on the product,” Cantrell claimed.
Who is eating nut butter on-the-go?
FBOMB’s primary target audience has been the active, health-focused endurance athletes in need of a high-fat, low-carb snack product. At roughly 250 calories per pouch, FBOMB products are a filling snack alternative to many of the sweetened energy gels and shots on the market for training athletes.
The company became a sponsor of the Ragnar, a 24-hour relay race, with events taking place in the US, Canada, and Europe.
Along with endurance athletes, FBOMB has attracted outdoor enthusiasts and consumers following low-carb nutrition programs like the keto diet, which advocates for foods high in specific fats and cutting out most carbohydrates.
FBOMB macadamia nut butter products have also reached an unexpected consumer audience, according to Cantrell.
“We even have a big cult following among long haul truck drivers,” he said, since truck drivers are oftentimes in need a quick, satiating snack while pulling extended drives cross-country.
FBOMB has been heavily promoting itself as keto-friendly as the diet continues to take off among US consumers. Google searches for the term 'keto' hit a five-year peak just this week (April 22 - April 28, 2018), according to Google Trends data.
“Right now, we’re very entrenched with the whole keto crowd,” Cantrell added.
Along with expanding distribution into more physical storefronts, the company will be supporting its brand with TV advertising to raise awareness of its suite of products.