Odd Ball Snacks No More: N.B. Company Renames Healthy, Tasty Treats
FREDERICTON – Plant-based, high in fibre, and gluten-sensitive: these are adjectives used to describe a Snak. but not necessarily a snack.
One New Brunswick company is rebranding and continuing to bring healthy snack foods to consumers that don’t taste like typical health food.
“We really drive home being truly healthy,” said Snak. owner Hannah Watson.
Watson started her company under the name Odd Ball Energy Balls, then moved to Odd Ball Snacks when she started including new products and is now rebranding with the name Snak.
Watson started selling her products out of the Northside Market until it closed. With the new Northside Creators Market opening up at Picaroons Roundhouse, Watson will be taking her products there on Saturday.
“It [the new Northside Market] will give me an opportunity, especially with the new rebranding, to be able to target the markets that I really want,” Watson said.
Once Watson left the old Northside Market, she felt the name and brand didn’t resonate with what she wanted to portray anymore.
“I needed something that was going to make me be able to show the world who I am a little bit better and I’m more than happy with the name that we’ve chosen,” Watson said.
Days before the Northside Market closure, Watson was accepted into The Summer Institute in Fredericton. The UNB program is a three-month intensive accelerator for entrepreneurs.
Her health foods are available online on her website and in some local Fredericton stores like Sequoia. But Watson has a future plan for Snak. While she can’t reveal much now, Watson said she has the keys to what will soon be the new Snak. House.
“Being able to be in a physical location just gives me a little bit more of an avenue to explore food,” she said.
Snak. offers seasonal items and with the new rebrand, she’ll also have five staple products available year-round.
Two of the staple products have been decided on. Peanut Butter Power Bars are a protein bar equivalent with pea protein, nuts, and nut butter. There are also peanut butter cups. Watson said “people go nuts” for the nutty cups.
“That [peanut butter cup] seems to be a favourite right across the board, no matter who you talk to,” Watson said.
“We use very basic ingredients and filter out all the sugars in a peanut butter cup.”
Snak. is partnered with Freddy Bean Roasters, their former neighbour at the Northside Market. On Snak.’s website, the Freddy Bean Roasters cold brew is for sale.
When the Snak. House opens, Watson said Freddy Bean Roasters coffee will be available at the location and the only coffee they’ll carry.
“Those guys definitely know how to do coffee,” Watson said.
During COVID-19, the Snak. and Freddy Bean Roasters partnership has grown even stronger. They helped each other through a difficult time for businesses.
Watson said she is thankful for the businesses and cafes that carry her products and her customers who are helping her along the healthy food journey.
“I opened my little snack stall not really thinking that it was going to grow to be what it is right now,” she said.
“And it took off. I wasn’t really alone in that revelation of food.”