Pringles is a brand of potato and wheat based snacks produced by Procter & Gamble. Pringles are sold in over 100 countries and have yearly sales of over US$1 billion.^[1] In April 2011, P&G agreed the $2.35Bn sale of the company to Diamond Foods of California, more than tripling the size of its snack business.^[2]

Procter & Gamble chose the Pringles name from a Cincinnati telephone book, having been inspired by Pringle Drive in Finneytown, Ohio, due to its pleasing sound.^[3] The original Pringles television commercials were written, produced and directed by Thomas Scott Cadden (composer of the original Mr. Clean jingle) in 1968, while working at Tatham-Laird and Kudner Advertising Agency in Chicago.

Pringles brand potato crisps were first sold in the United States in October 1968, and distributed internationally by the mid-1970s.^[4]

According to the patent, Pringles were invented by Alexander Liepa of Montgomery, Ohio.^[5] Gene Wolfe developed the machine that cooks them.^[6] Their consistent saddle shape is mathematically known as a hyperbolic paraboloid.^[7] It has been reported that their design is aided by supercomputers.^[8][9]

Pringles have only about 42% potato content, with the remainder being wheat starch and flours (potato, corn, and rice) mixed with vegetable oils and an emulsifier.^[10] Contrary to a popular misconception, Pringles crisps are fried, not baked.^[11]

They were originally known as "Pringles Newfangled Potato Chips", but other snack manufacturers objected, saying that Pringles failed to meet the definition of a potato "chip". The US Food and Drug Administration weighed in on the matter, and in 1975, they ruled that Pringles could only use the word chip in their product name within the following phrase: "potato chips made from dried potatoes."^[12] Faced with such an unpalatable appellation, Pringles eventually opted to rename their product "potato crisps" instead of chips. However, this later led to other issues in the United Kingdom, where the term "potato crisp" refers to the product that Americans call "potato chips" (See legal section below).

Pringles is advertised in the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia and the Republic of Ireland with the slogan "Once you pop, the fun don't stop",^[13] along with the original slogan "Once you pop, you can't stop".^[14]

Pringles, as a product brand, is especially known for its packaging, a tubular paper-board can with a foil-lined interior and a resealable plastic lid, which was invented by Fredric J. Baur. Baur was an organic chemist and food storage technician who specialized in research and development and quality control for Cincinnati-based Procter & Gamble Co. He died on March 4, 2008. Baur's children honored his request to bury him in one of the cans by placing part of his cremated remains in a Pringles container in his grave.^[15][16][17]

The Pringles logo is a stylized cartoon caricature of the head of a male figure (commonly known as "Julius Pringles"), with a large mustache and parted bangs (until 2001, the character had eyebrows and his bow tie framed the product name). The crisps are made to a uniform size and with a hyperbolic paraboloid saddle shape, so that they can be stacked very neatly within the container, rather than being packaged loosely in a bag. The cans come in 23g, 40g, 50g, 80g,^[18] 100g, 110g, 145g, 150g, 155g, 160g, 163g, 165g, 170 g, 175g, 181g, 182g, 190g (Party Size), 200g and 230g sizes.

Pringles come in several flavors, and occasionally Procter & Gamble produces limited edition runs. Standard flavors include original, salt and vinegar, sour cream and onion, cheddar cheese, and barbecue. Some flavors may be distributed only to limited market areas. For example, Prawn Cocktail, smokey bacon^[19] and curry flavors have been available in the United Kingdom. Seasonal flavors, past and present, include ketchup, zesty lime and chili, chili cheese dog, "pizzalicious", paprika, Texas BBQ sauce, and cajun. A "low-fat" variety was also sold at one point. Examples of limited edition flavors include honey mustard, cheesy fries, onion blossom, mozzarella cheese stick, screamin' dill pickle, and Mexican layered dip. At one point, in the early 1990s, "Corn Pringles" were available. The canister was black and had cartoon images of corn as well as the normal packaging standards. The crisps were made of corn and resembled a corn chip in flavor and texture.

Pringles also produces several "multi-grain" varieties which have some of their base starch ingredients replaced with corn flour, barley flour, wheat bran and black beans. To address consumer interest in healthier ingredients, Pringles experimented in the late 80's with bringing brand extensions to market that included vegetables such as broccoli, tomatoes, and carrots in the potato dough, but the market was deemed too small.

5 new flavors were introduced in Asia, namely: Soft-Shelled crab, Grilled Shrimp, Seaweed, Blueberry & Hazelnut, and Lemon. The Grilled Shrimp chips are pink in color, while Seaweed is colored green.

Two limited market flavors, Cheeseburger and "Taco Night", were recalled in March 2010 as a safety precaution after salmonella was found in a Basic Food Flavors plant which produces the flavor-enhancing hydrolyzed vegetable protein used in those flavors.^[20]

In a the UK High Court in July 2008, Procter & Gamble lawyers successfully argued against a VAT and Duties Tribunal decision that Pringles were not crisps, even though it said "Potato Crisps" on the container, as their actual potato content was only 42%. This exempted Pringles from the 17.5% Value Added Tax for potato chips and potato-derived snacks.^[21] In May, 2009 the Court of Appeal reversed the earlier decision. A spokesman for Procter & Gamble stated that it had been paying the Value Added Tax protectively and owed no back taxes.^[22][23]

• Lay's Stax
• Kryzpo
• Torengos

• Official website
• Pringles Jingle Competition site