An actually good protein bar and gut-friendly gummies
+ a recap of our first CPG trends event!
We’re still riding the high (metaphorical, we promise) from our first-ever IN SEASON event—Express Checkout’s new quarterly event format where we feature three CPG trends we’re tracking on that season.
We celebrated 4/20 (IYKYK) with an ode to some of our favorite CPG trends right now: the *budding* hemp-derived THC category, dates in everything, and the new age of flavor-packed sauces + dips.
It was insane to fill a room—the gorgeous Air office, that is (shoutout Air)—with ~100 CPG founders, investors, industry partners + friends from our amazing NYC community.
Thank you immensely to our partners Glimpse for making this possible, and NOWADAYS for being our featured beverage partner (and introducing its brand-new low-THC drinks line), and to the iconic list of brands who all shared their innovative, delicious, occasionally ~functional 🍃~ products for the occasion:
THC Trend: Dad Grass, Cann, Mary & Jane, The High Confectionary, Clebby’s
Dates Trend: Harken Sweets, Gato Dates, datefix
Dips & Sauces Trend: Cotto, BEZI, Little Sesame, Tursh, BESTO®, Maazah
…and all of the brands that we enjoyed alongside our trends: Freestyle Snacks, Gotcha Focaccia, S'NOODS, Posana, , Zesty Z - Fiber Pita Chips, Ancient Crunch, Goldilocks, Curious Elixirs, Bjorn Qorn
Perhaps most importantly, there was the brain behind the whole aesthetic experience (AKA our fabulous event planner): Erica Bonelli, founder of Philo Studios! Philo is a full service event planning, design and production studio that creates beautiful and meaningful activations for CPG & tech businesses. She is an absolute creative genius, and we cannot wait to work with her again on our quarterly event series!
We cannot wait to turn this into a quarterly event, featuring our favorite CPG trends of each season. If you want to partner on the next one, feel free to reach out!
With that, let’s get into this week’s pickups →
Nate’s Pickup:
Good Greed Candy
I’ve said this many many many times before. I LOVE CANDY. I honestly might have candy almost everyday. Please don’t tell my dentist. And guess what? It makes me happy, and happy people are healthy. So there’s some quick maths for you. But other than loving candy, I love discovering new candy brands. And my god are there so many new ones. One of those new entrants to the space is Good Greed. Yes they are another low sugar better-for-you candy brand, but they have a little trick up their sleeve that I love. Let’s get into it 😉
Quick Facts: A better-for-you candy brand specializing in gut-friendly, low-sugar gummies. Founded by university friends Alana, Carolyn, and Sabrina, Good Greed was developed alongside a registered dietitian.
Reasons to love:
My stomach is NOT in knots. Good Greed skips the ingredients that typically mess with your gut— think sugar alcohols like erythritol, allulose, IMO, and the massive doses of prebiotic fiber most “healthy” candies lean on to hit a low-sugar callout.
A well-rounded candy. Flavor-wise, they’re having fun here. Peach is the more conventional pick, but cherry is where it gets interesting. I really think that not enough brands are leaning into cherry, and that’s a shame—it’s tart, sweet, and sour all at once. Each gummy is also made with real cherry or peach purée, so the flavors actually taste like the fruit they’re named after. And because the sugar load is lower, you skip the blood sugar spike-and-crash that comes with a bag of conventional gummies.
Built with an actual expert. There are a lot of brands out there claiming to be better-for-you, or at the very least just a better and “healthier” product. But you don’t often see one actually go out of its way to verify that, to formulate the product from the start with experts to make it better. Good Greed partnered with Abbey Sharp, one of North America’s top dietitians, to formulate the product—specifically to avoid the “gut wreck” most better-for-you candies cause. If you’re going to slap health claims on a package, might as well actually bring in the experts. More brands should really be doing this, especially as consumers increasingly want to know the claims they’re seeing are coming from a legit place.
Where to buy: Available Online and at select stores in NYC
Jenna’s Pickup:
Posana Mango Coconut Turmeric Protein Bar
🚨New (actually good) protein bar alert!🚨
I don’t need to be the one to tell you: There are SO many protein bars out there. By numbers alone, the category appears saturated—but the reality is, there’s still a lot of room for innovation. If you’ve been trying to sneak more protein into your diet (how unique and novel!), you know: a lot of protein bars kind of suck. They either A) taste like a candy bar but are hiiiighly processed and full of tummy-disrupting ingredients, or B) are “natural,” but dry, chalky, loaded with sugar, and/or taste like cardboard smattered with dusty chocolate chips.
But Posana, which was one of the many wonderful brands that sampled at our IN SEASON event, has presented a new protein bar that fits into the very exclusive Category C (one that Samsara Nutrition, an Expo West fave, also belongs to).
Quick Facts: Plant-based protein bar featuring 20g protein, 9g fiber, and 0g sugar in a delightfully fruit-forward flavor. Posana is the brainchild of Adi, a current Nutrition student at UC Berkeley who’s passionate about flavor and nutrition in equal parts (and it shows).
Reasons to love:
The FLAVOR. I’m so tired of seeing a protein bar aisle filled with “cookie dough” and “peanut butter chocolate.” In 2026, most other grocery store aisles feature a breadth of flavors… while protein bars have stayed relatively uninventive on the flavor front. A tropical, fruity flavor might seem blasphemous next to artificial “birthday cake” flavoring—but it is utterly delicious. The Mango Coconut flavor is bright, summery, and tastes like real food (because it is), and the almond butter base and hint of vanilla offer a satisfying pastry-like sweetness.
Super simple ingredients. The base is Posana’s plant-based protein blend—made of pea, rice, and almond protein powders—almond butter and chicory root fiber. It’s sweetened with allulose and stevia leaf extract, and flavored with real mango powder, shredded coconut, vanilla, and turmeric!
Texture is spot on. While other protein bars unnaturally mimic candy bars or require a jaw workout to chew, these are soft and chewy, almost like a soft-baked cookie. Plus, they’re dotted with pea protein crisps and real shredded coconut for textural variety.
Where to buy: eatposana.com
This week, we sat down with Mark Rushmore, co-founder of Suri (short for Sustainable Rituals)—the UK-based electric toothbrush brand that caught Gwyneth Paltrow’s eye organically before landing in Erewhon, and now Target stores nationwide. (Check out our piece on UK brands entering the US!)
We also covered the week’s biggest CPG news—new updates to the THC regulatory saga, Beyond Meat’s pivot into beverage, Gatorade’s biggest refresh in 60 years, and the Finnish Long Drink’s $325M acquisition by the makers of White Claw. Let’s get into it! Check it out here →
Thanks for reading! Anything you think we should try for an upcoming edition of Express Checkout? Email us at hello@expresscheckout.co