Pladis Americas is bringing the snack aisle into pumpkin spice season with a licensed flavor collaboration: Flipz, the number-one chocolate-covered pretzel brand, and Dunkin' have co-developed Flipz Pumpkin Spice Donut-Flavored Covered Pretzels, a limited-time offering designed to translate Dunkin's Pumpkin Cake Donut into a sweet-salty retail format. The SKU is on shelf now through October at select retailers nationwide.
Retail Footprint
The LTO is slated across a notably broad channel mix for a seasonal item: Kroger and Albertsons anchor the conventional grocery side, while CVS provides drug-channel coverage, Stop & Shop and Wakefern extend Northeast grocery reach, Dollar General covers value, and Five Below brings in the novelty-gifting tier. That combination suggests a deliberate multi-channel ACV push rather than a narrow anchor-retailer exclusive — a distribution strategy increasingly common for seasonal flavors competing for limited planogram space during the fall reset window. Floor stacks and end-cap placements tied to fall seasonal sets are the likely vehicle at conventional grocery, where pumpkin spice SKUs have historically driven above-average velocity in the September–October scan window.
Category & Competitive Context
Chocolate-covered pretzels sit at the intersection of the salty snacks and confection aisles, a position that gives Flipz access to both planogram sets and gives retailers a dual-merchandising option. The category has benefited from growing consumer demand for permissible indulgence snacks, where the sweet-salty format commands a premium price per ounce relative to straight pretzel or straight chocolate SKUs. Pumpkin spice as a flavor platform continues to perform: syndicated data consistently shows that pumpkin-flavored innovation in salty snacks and confections generates strong trial velocity in the first four to six weeks of fall resets before tapering — making the October sell-through window critical for Flipz's turns at retail.
The Dunkin' license adds meaningful brand equity to the shelf proposition. Inspire Brands operates more than 14,200 Dunkin' locations across nearly 40 global markets, giving the co-branded packaging instant recognition with consumers already conditioned to associate the banner with fall pumpkin offerings. Brian Gilbert, Vice President of Retail Business Development at Inspire Brands, framed the collaboration as an extension of Dunkin's seasonal identity into a new consumption occasion — putting the Pumpkin Cake Donut flavor profile within reach wherever snack retail is shopped, not just at QSR.
For pladis Americas, the play fits a broader licensed-flavor and brand-collaboration strategy that several mid-tier snack manufacturers have adopted to differentiate shelf presence without permanent SKU proliferation. Shivani Arora, Marketing Director at pladis Americas, noted that pumpkin spice has crossed from seasonal trend into cultural staple — a cue that the flavor platform can support licensing investment rather than just core-line line extensions.
With the window closing at end of October, retailer execution — specifically in-store display compliance, TPR timing, and secondary placement — will largely determine whether the SKU drives incremental category dollars or simply cannibalizes existing Flipz turns.
Written by Michael Politz, Author of Guide to Restaurant Success: The Proven Process for Starting Any Restaurant Business From Scratch to Success (ISBN: 978-1-119-66896-1), Founder of Food & Beverage Magazine, the leading online magazine and resource in the industry. Designer of the Bluetooth logo and recognized in Entrepreneur Magazine's "Top 40 Under 40" for founding American Wholesale Floral, Politz is also the Co-founder of the Proof Awards and the CPG Awards and a partner in numerous consumer brands across the food and beverage sector.
