
At PepsiCo, nutrition starts with our recipes.
When we develop new foods in our test kitchens — yes, we cook in kitchens — we use whole grains, fruits and vegetables, dairy, and protein. Our R&D team innovates with new technology too: for example, creating an air-fried crisp that’s just as crispy as a chip fried in oil. Products like Off the Eaten Path’s Veggie Crisps show that snacks made with real veggies can taste great and be fun to eat. We’re also introducing more functional ingredients, like the panax ginseng in soulboost lift.
When we’re sinking a spoon into a hearty bowl of Old Fashioned Quaker Oats, we realize your first thought may not be about the stats on the nutrition label. The whole-grain goodness of Quaker Oats, with a history of more than 140 years, is tried and true. And today the demand for wholesome, nutritious food is high. With good reason.
We’re making sure to offer nutritious options that consumers are seeking, while still providing the same great taste. Our nutrition goals align with two of the United Nations’ sustainable development goals — Good Health and Well-Being, and Zero Hunger — and we help to work towards a future without malnutrition, hunger or food insecurity.
As for our trusty favorites, we’ve reduced added sugars, sodium and saturated fat without changing the flavors people know and love (because we know you’d notice). The recipe may have changed, but the familiar crunch of Lay’s will still make you smile from ear to ear.
Our world isn’t standing still. Neither should our products.
We’re constantly innovating in new areas, reformulating our recipes and looking for ways to improve their nutritional content using high-quality ingredients and new technologies. Here’s how we’ve been changing things up.
Nutrition
Product Spotlight
Nutrition innovation is happening in all our R&D centers, where some of the most experienced and creative food scientists in the industry experiment, cross-test and dream up new foods and beverages that are as nourishing as they are flavorful. We invest in companies and people who are pushing the future of nutritious eating forward. Here’s what we’ve been up to.


Building a Greenhouse
In 2017, we launched the Greenhouse Accelerator Program, a mentor-guided program supporting the acceleration of the latest innovators who seek to transform the ways consumers eat, drink and live their lives. We invite these big-dreaming entrepreneurs to collaborate with the experts within PepsiCo — and we award grant funding to companies with promising solutions.
Offering Positive Food and Beverage Choices
Consumers are looking to drink less sugar, and we’re helping to make that happen. We have increased the number of drinks with 100 calories or less in our Top 26 beverage markets. By 2025, for example, at least two-thirds of our beverage portfolio volume will have 100 or less calories from added sugars in a 12-ounce serving. Meanwhile, we continue to roll out reduced- and no-calorie versions of our iconic brands, including Pepsi Black, Mirinda and 7UP.
Across our foods portfolio we are reducing sodium and saturated fat. As we keep innovating, more and more of the ingredients in our foods are nutritious vegetables, whole grains and protein, all part of pep+ (PepsiCo Positive), our strategic end-to-end transformation with sustainability at the center. By 2025, 75% of our global foods portfolio volume will contain less than 1.3 mg sodium per calorie and less than 1.1 g saturated fat per calorie.

PepsiCo
Nutrition criteria
We outlined a set of science-based nutrition guidelines called the PepsiCo Nutrition Criteria (PNC) to meet our 2025 company goals. The PNC sets standards for nutrients to limit and nutrients and food groups to encourage. The guidelines are based on recommendations from the World Health Organization (WHO), the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), the National Academy of Medicine and dietary guidelines from several countries. We seek to provide more nutrition in every sip and every bite.