Skip to main content
Man posing with an antique car with the Frito-Lay text written on it

Our Past

In 1932, C.E. Doolin entered a small San Antonio cafe and purchased a bag of corn chips. After learning the manufacturer was eager to sell his business, he bought the recipe and started making Fritos corn chips in his mother’s kitchen. He sold them from his Model T Ford.

That same year, Herman W. Lay started a snack food delivery company in Nashville. He too bought out the manufacturer to form H.W. Lay & Company, which became one of the largest snack food companies in the Southeast.

In 1961, the two companies merged and Frito-Lay, Inc. was born. Four years later in 1965, Frito-Lay, Inc. merged with Pepsi-Cola to form PepsiCo. Snack lovers everywhere rejoiced.

Our Present

29 snack brands, 55,000 dedicated Frito-Lay employees and enough potatoes per year to reach to the moon and back. (If they were stacked end to end.) We aren't kidding when we say we go the extra mile to bring you your favorite snacks.

A supermarket employee putting a bag of Smartfood in the products shelf
A group of 4 people smiling around a table with a laptop, notebooks, snacks and drinks

Our Future

As part of PepsiCo, our mission is to create more smiles with every sip and every bite. How? By embracing Winning with Purpose. That is, winning in the marketplace, accelerating growth and keeping our commitment to the planet and our communities. A clear set of strategies that will make us Faster, Stronger, and Better, define this vision.

What’s more, we believe every consumer should have access to their favorite snack, everywhere. We own the manufacturing process from seed to shelf and actively invest in technology to automate key steps of the process. This helps us be more agile in what we need to make, who we need to make it for, and how we can best deliver it to snack lovers from coast to coast.

Latest News

Here at Frito-Lay there's always something new going on. Read all about it here.

TASTE OF THE NFL: A CULINARY AND GRIDIRON EXTRAVAGANZA TO HELP GENYOUTH TACKLE STUDENT HUNGER

Super Bowl LVIII Weekend’s Largest Philanthropic Culinary Event, Presented by Frito-Lay, Quaker, and the PepsiCo Foundation, Unveils Star-Studded Lineup of Chefs, NFL Players, and Culinary Experiences NEW YORK (January 9, 2024) – Get ready for an unparalleled culinary, sports, entertainment

Read More

Frito-Lay Awards Four Outstanding Students With First-Ever Community Builder Scholarship

$100,000 in Scholarships Presented to Next-Generation Leaders Committed to Improving their Communities Across the U.S. PLANO, Texas, March 28, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Frito-Lay® today announced it awarded $25,000 to four scholarship recipients, each actively leading and upli

Read More
Load More Stories
GO TO NEWSROOM
Close dialog×