Everyone's got their guilty pleasures when it comes to what they put in their mouth. Whether you like your treats sweet, savory, baked, fried, spicy, buttery, minty, chewy, chocolately, on a stick, or covered in cheese dust, the world's makers of snacks and confections have something for you.
But what goodies do people in Asia turn to when they just need a little nosh? That's what we're here to find out.
The following facts about Asia's favourite snacks and candies are derived from the 2021 edition of Campaign Asia-Pacific's exclusive Asia's Top 1000 Brands research, done in partnership with Nielsen IQ. The region's most comprehensive research on consumer brand perception, Asia's Top 1000 Brands asks consumers in 14 Asia-Pacific markets to name the brands they consider the best in 15 major product and service categories. From this, we compile the overall Asia's Top 1000 Brands ranking, a list of the top 100 brands in each market, and a variety of features and category-based reports like this one.
As alluded to above, snack foods cover a wide array of choices, so we're actually giving you not one but three top 10 lists, covering three sub-categories of the food category. Without further ado, we give you...
Asia's top snack foods:
Biscuits, crackers and cookies
1 Oreo
2 Ritz
3 Meiji
4 Quaker
5 Orion
6 Kjeldsens
7 Arnotts
8 Parle
9 Britannia
10 Good Day
Candy
1 Cadbury
2 Ferrero Rocher
3 Kit Kat
4 Nestle
5 Snickers
6 Hershey's
7 Mentos
8 M&M's
9 Lotte
10 Chupa Chups
Salty snakes
1 Lay’s
2 Pringles
3 Calbee
4 Cadbury
5 Lotte
6 Orion
7 Dorritos
8 Cheetos
9 Meiji
10 Three Squirrels
Still hungry for knowledge? Here's some more tasty morsels from our survey of the region's favourite snack and candy brands.
Biscuits, crackers and cookies
Regional No 1 Oreo tops the charts in five specific markets — China, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam.
Oreo also finishes in second place in Hong Kong, Korea, Singapore and Taiwan and in third in Australia, Japan and Philippines.
Regional No 2 Ritz ranks highly in many markets but is the top choice nowhere. Its highest rankings are 4th (Taiwan and Thailand) and 5th (Australia and Indonesia).
Market-specific No 1 rankings for brands in the regional top 10:
Oreo: China, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam
Meiji: Singapore Orion: South Korea
Kjeldsens: Hong Kong
Arnotts: Australia
Parle: India
Candy
Regional No 1 Cadbury is the top choice in three markets — Australia, India, Malaysia. It also comes in second in New Zealand and Singapore, and third in Indonesia.
Market-specific No 1 rankings for brands in the regional top 10:
Cadbury: Australia, India, Malaysia
Ferrero Rocher: China, Hong Kong, Taiwan
Kit Kat: Singapore, Vietnam
Hershey's: Philippines
Mentos: Indonesia
Chupa Chups: Korea
Salty snacks
Regional No 1 Lay's is the top brand in only two markets — China and Taiwan. It comes in second in Hong Kong, India and Taiwan, and third in Indonesia, Philippines and Vietnam. Regional No 2 Pringles attains its spot despite being No 1 in no markets. It finishes second in Korea and Philippines, third in Australia, and fourth in Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia and Singapore.
Market-specific No. 1 rankings for brands in the regional top 10:
Lay's: China, Taiwan
Calbee: Hong Kong, Japan
Orion: Korea, Vietnam
Doritos: Australia
(Courtesy: Campaign India)