TRENOS SiGINT: Brad’s Air-Dried Vegetables as a New Snack Platform

Analyst: Scott Mathias - December, 2025

Signal:

US based, Brad’s has effectively created a platform architecture for turning whole vegetables into shelf-stable snacks. Their lineup, chips, flats, salads-to-go, keto crisps, demonstrates how a single low-temp air-drying technology can unlock multiple product formats without drifting into UPF territory.

Human Factor:

Consumers want veg, but they also want convenience. Brad’s gives them both without guilt, without processing fatigue, and without needing to understand a chemistry set on the back of the pack. It’s simple, trustworthy, colourful and crucially, reliable. The kind of brand you grab because you know the veg is real.

TRENOS Metrics Snapshot

Field	Data
Signal	Air-dried vegetables emerging as a multi-format snack platform
Data Point	Expanding Brad’s portfolio: Kale, Veggie Flats, Chips, Keto Crisps, Snackable Salads
TikTok Views	Strong growth in “whole veg snacks”, “non-UPF snacks”, “air-dried foods”
Retail Footprint	Whole Foods nationwide + US natural channel, gaining conventional interest
Ingredient Format	Air-dried vegetables & seeds (tomato, zucchini, onion, kale, herbs, carrots)
Product Range	Chips, flats, crisps, salads-to-go — scalable formats sharing one technology
Consumer Segment	Wellness snackers, anti-UPF shoppers, keto crossovers, plant-curious
Brand Origin	Bucks County, Pennsylvania (USA)
Export Status	USA domestic; strong fit for APAC premium retailers
Trend Classification	Whole-veg snacking / Clean label / Waste reduction / Fresh-to-shelf value
System Pressure Point	Perishability → stabilization, nutrient retention, supply-chain efficiency
Momentum	Rising — driven by packaging visibility + non-UPF cultural demand
Sentiment	Very positive; brand seen as authentic and nutritionally credible
Where Signal Is Loudest	Whole Foods, wellness influencers, mom-shoppers, keto communities
Related Links	https://bradsplantbased.com

Long Play Analysis - Brad’s Air-Dried Vegetables as a New Snack Platform

Brad’s demonstrates how air-drying can unlock a category, not just a product. The broader future-food narrative here isn’t about kale, it’s about technology-enabled waste reduction, ingredient transparency, and the strategic revival of vegetables as snack formats. With global retailer interest in non-UPF options rising, this marks a shift away from extruded plant-protein mimicry and toward intact, whole-veg value capture.

Internationally, this is the kind of platform ripe for partnership or replication. Air-drying requires lower capex than extrusion or fermentation, makes local vegetable supply chains more resilient, and fits cultural expectations around “real food” far better than engineered alternatives. Expect retailers from Asia to Oceania to eye this format as they seek higher-margin, lower-waste solutions.

Brad’s is not a kale brand. It’s a template for what next-gen plant-based snacking can look like when we stop over-complicating things.

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