History of Lay's

Lay's traces its origins to 1932, when Herman W. Lay began distributing potato chips for a snack company in Nashville, Tennessee, travelling across the American South to sell them. In 1938, he bought the company he had been working for and renamed it H.W. Lay & Company. Lay's became one of the first potato chip brands to be marketed nationally in the United States.

In 1961, H.W. Lay & Company merged with the Frito Company, the maker of Fritos corn chips, to form Frito-Lay. Just four years later, in 1965, Frito-Lay merged with Pepsi-Cola to create PepsiCo, which has owned the Lay's brand ever since. The brand's famous slogan, "Betcha can't eat just one," helped build its popularity in the 1960s.

In many countries, Lay's products are sold under local names, including Walkers in the United Kingdom, Sabritas in Mexico, and Chipsy in Egypt. The brand is known for its regional flavours designed around local tastes, and its "Do Us a Flavor" campaign, launched in 2012, invited customers to suggest new flavours.

Today, Lay's is one of the world's best-selling potato chip brands and a central part of PepsiCo's snack business. It continues to introduce new flavours and baked or reduced-fat options as consumer interest in healthier snacks grows.