The Untold Truth Of Rold Gold

The world of snack foods is vast and ever-changing. There are new munchies, in a seemingly boundless array of flavors, constantly shaking up the shelves at the grocery store. And yet, there are a few snack stalwarts that we always turn to — the classic standbys that have held our hearts as times (and finger foods) continue to change. One such snack is, undeniably, pretzels. And if you consider yourself partial to pretzels, chances are you've reached for a bag of Rold Gold a time or two.

Rold Gold is more than 100 years old, and is practically synonymous with pretzels at this point. The company prides itself (and named itself) for the baked, golden glow it achieves on each one of its salty, crunchy pretzel pieces. And while Rold Gold may have changed in certain ways over the decades, the quality and character of its pretzels has not. Each new bag is like reaching into a treasure trove of tasty treats — whether you like them plain and unencumbered, paired with your favorite dip, or crushed up in a recipe.

So grab yourself a bag, get crunching, and read on for all the ins and outs of Rold Gold and what's made this brand so beloved after more than a century.

The company that we know and love as Rold Gold started out as the American Cone and Pretzel Company. So how did we come to know it by its lustrous moniker?

By 1920, the American Cone and Pretzel Company was seeing great success as a national pretzel and snack manufacturer and producing all kinds of new product patents. That year, it also rolled out its newest product line, called Rold Gold Butter Pretzels (via Hidden City Philadelphia). Why Rold Gold? Well, if you ask the company today, they say it's because "that's what it tastes like in your mouth" (via Food Network).

It's safe to assume that Rold Gold pretzels become one of the company's most successful products — and by the time the company's founder, L.J. Schumaker, died in 1948, the American Cone and Pretzel Company was already colloquially known as Rold Gold (via Hidden City Philadelphia). We can admit that, at the very least, it does roll off the tongue a little easier. Eventually, the name change was made official, and the rest is pretzel history.

Rold Gold may have started out as a family-owned company, but it was corporate ownership that launched the brand to the global success it enjoys today. For more than 60 years, Rold Gold has operated under the umbrella of snack giant Frito-Lay (a division of PepsiCo, Inc.), which also owns iconic brands like Doritos, Tostitos, Cheetos, and more. Frito-Lay is arguably the top salty snack brand in the world, controlling more than a third of the global market for snack chips (via Encyclopedia.com).

Frito-Lay purchased ownership of Rold Gold in 1961. At that time, the news didn't make a huge splash, as pretzels weren't quite a nationally-beloved snack phenomenon yet (via Chicago Tribune). Over the next few decades, that started to change, as more and more people turned to pretzels as a healthier snack option, and innovation led to new flavors (via Orlando Sentinel). Combine that with the marketing power and brand recognition that a company like Frito-Lay can conjure, and by the '90s, pretzels were the best-selling snack food on the market.

Ever wonder how Rold Gold pretzels get their signature golden glow and perfectly salty crunch? It's the result of a very specific and involved pretzel-making process designed to pump out more than 100 million pounds of uniformly crispy twists, rods, and sticks every year. Rold Gold gave Food Network a sneak peak inside one of their factories and explained exactly how all those pretzels get made.

First, the pretzel dough is made with flour, corn syrup, and oil. Once the huge batches of dough are mixed and formed (using bulk-sized equipment), a machine rolls the dough out into sheets. Another set of machines cuts, measures, and forms the pretzel shapes. Next, all those pretzels get sprayed with a salt water bath. This is what gives Rold Golds their signature golden color, and apparently also helps the final outer coating of rock salt stick to the pretzels. Finally, the pretzels head through a giant industrial oven to bake. The hot and fresh hard pretzels are then weighed out, packed, and sealed.

The snack food industry, much like any other, is a cutthroat world of competition and innovation. Brands are always looking to come up with the next big thing, and keep everyone else from stealing their market thunder — and sometimes, things can get messy. Pretzels are no exception. And as recently as 2021, Rold Gold was locked in a legal battle against one of its biggest competitors, Snyder's of Hanover.

As Reuters reported, the issue started back in 2012 when Snyder's applied to trademark the term "Pretzel Crisps" for one of its products. Rold Gold sued, arguing that it was too generic of a term to be eligible for a trademark. After all, any flat, crunchy pretzel can be described as a pretzel crisp, right? Rold Gold certainly wouldn't want consumers associating such a broad term with Snyder's specifically. In 2014, and again in 2017, the courts ruled in Rold Gold's favor, and Snyder's appealed the ruling. Then again in 2021, a federal court ruled in favor of Rold Gold, saying that Snyder's cannot "monopolize the common name." It's a win for Rold Gold, and hopefully a win for fans of pretzel crisps everywhere.

While Rold Gold has established itself as a beloved brand through years of consistent salty goodness and crunch, a few celebrity endorsements certainly haven't hurt the brand's notoriety, either. Rold Gold has partnered with several well-known and well-regarded celebrities to boost its name and really drive home the point that, when it comes down to it, almost everyone loves pretzels.

It all started with the one and only Jason Alexander. The "Seinfeld” star became the face of Rold Gold's first ever national commercials after the brand was bought by Frito-Lay. He was featured in a series of TV ads for the brand, which executives point to as a reason for booming sales at the time (via The New York Times).

More recently, Rold Gold has signed on Joel McHale, star of "Community" and former host of E!'s "The Soup," as its newest ambassador. McHale, in an exclusive interview with Mashed, shared his favorite ways to eat pretzels (which is usually paired with a really good IPA) and praised Rold Gold for being "so ubiquitous in a really good way, because people love eating them."