Pop! Gourmet named ‘Snack Producer of the Year’

Snack Food & Wholesale Bakery magazine has announced that its 2015 “Snack Producer of the Year” award will go to Pop! Gourmet Popcorn, Kent, WA. The company manufactures ready-to-eat popcorn in 20 flavors, including:

Fire Corn (includes crispy slices of real jalapeño)
Infused Chocolate Caramel With Sea Salt
Infused Garlic & Parmesan
White Truffle Bliss

For a complete list of flavors and products, visit the Pop! Gourmet Popcorn website.

Pop! Gourmet Popcorn has also made a name for itself via its co-branded products, such as:

Butter Toffee (made with Brown & Haley Almond Roca Buttercrunch candy)
Rogue Blue Cheese (made with Rogue Creamery blue cheese)
Sriracha (made with Huy Fong Foods Sriracha Hot Chili Sauce)
Wakaya Ginger, Sea Salt and Caramel (made with Wakaya Perfection organic pink Fijian ginger)

Pop! Gourmet Popcorn also worked with noted Seattle Chef Tom Douglas on its “Rub With Love” products, which take either an ethnic route seen in its African Peri Peri and Chinese 12-Spice popcorns, or go comforting and regional, as in its Smoky BBQ & Northwest Cheddar product. Its Diet Pop! Sunflower Oil & Sea Salt, made with high-oleic sunflower oil and coming in at 35 calories per cup, was manufactured in partnership with renowned fitness guru Tony Little.

Accolades for Pop! Gourmet Popcorn products have been forthcoming since the company’s inception. The company has received a Gold Sofi Award in 2013 for its Rogue Blue Cheese, and its Sriracha product was a 2014 Sofi finalist (Sofi Awards are named annually by the Specialty Foods Association). It also won a “Most Innovative New Product” award at the 2013 Sweets & Snacks Expo for its Fire Corn, and again in 2014 for Sriracha. In February 2012, Oprah Winfrey named the company’s products one of her “Favorite Things,” specifically noting White Truffle Bliss as her personal favorite (but she has reportedly been known to order the full line to serve at special events).

Pop! Gourmet Popcorn was founded in 2011 by David Israel and has seen production and revenue climb ever higher each year—reportedly growing from $1 million in sales its first year to a projected $10 million for 2014. In addition to its branded products, Pop! Gourmet Popcorn also operates a wholesale business.

Complete coverage of Pop! Gourmet Popcorn as the 2015 Snack Food & Wholesale Bakery “Snack Producer of the Year,” including a look at its brand-new production facility in Tukwila, WA, will be featured in the February 2015 issue of the magazine.

Douglas J. Peckenpaugh is Group Publisher of Snack Food & Wholesale Bakery, Dairy Foods, The National Provisioner, and Packaging Strategies for BNP Media. He has nearly three decades of publishing experience following the food industry from farm to fork, covering agriculture, ingredient processing, retail grocery branding, foodservice menu development, and food product R&D and manufacturing. He serves in leadership roles at his local suburban Chicago food pantry and church. Doug studied Professional and Creative Writing at Purdue University.

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