Jason Karp fondly recalls the winter mornings of his childhood in the Northeast when he would wake up to the delightful news: No school today, it’s a snow day. “There was this overwhelming sense of freedom, happiness, and euphoria, as if I had the entire day ahead of me,” Karp reminisced. As a former investment fund manager, he is now the co-founder of the Hu snacking brand and the founder and CEO of HumanCo. With his latest venture, Snow Days, he aims to recapture that euphoric feeling of freedom from his youth. The inaugural product under the Snow Days brand is an organic, gluten-free frozen pizza bite, available for direct purchase on the brand’s website.
Karp believes these healthier pizza bites provide families an opportunity to reclaim the joy of carefree moments—allowing them to indulge in fun without guilt. He acknowledges the challenges adults face in selecting nutritious food, often scrutinizing ingredient lists and nutritional facts, weighing the pleasure of a product against its less healthy components. “That vigilance, skepticism, and paranoia can take away your freedom,” Karp explained. “Snow Days is designed to let nature liberate you, so you can enjoy these as a meal, share them with your family, savor them as an adult, or serve them at gatherings without regret.”
Karp founded Hu, a consumer packaged goods brand recognized for its chocolate and the associated Hu Kitchen restaurant in New York, after facing his own health challenges. Diagnosed with multiple autoimmune diseases in his 20s linked to his dietary choices, Karp’s journey led to Hu’s acquisition by Mondelez International in January. In 2019, he established HumanCo as a separate entity focused on investing in brands that align with values of healthier living, transparency, and sustainability. Snow Days embodies these dietary and ethical principles.
The pizza bites are gluten-free and packed with vegetables and functional ingredients, offering a healthier profile than many frozen snacks. The crust is made from cassava, with ingredients like tomato, carrot, sweet potato, spinach, bell pepper, apple, and onion. The cheese is grass-fed mozzarella, complemented by organic eggs, grass-fed butter, olive oil, and apple cider vinegar. Remarkably, Karp claims, “It tastes like the best pizza I’ve ever had.” The bites have also passed the kid test, with his discerning 7 and 12-year-old children enjoying them, along with many other young taste testers from the development team. “My kids are picky eaters, yet they devour these,” Karp shared, emphasizing their commitment to taste because they understand that taste is often the biggest concern consumers have with healthier options.
Although the concept for Snow Days was brewing before the pandemic, Karp noted that recent events have solidified the idea and expedited product development. Families are increasingly in need of healthy, convenient food options that appeal to children, particularly with many adults working from home and kids attending virtual classes. The frozen food segment has surged during the pandemic, with spending on frozen items rising by 21% last year compared to 2019, and nearly all frozen categories seeing double-digit sales increases, according to a report by the American Frozen Food Institute and The Food Industry Association (FMI). Karp pointed out that consumers now perceive frozen food as healthier and fresher, which aligns with the production and preservation methods utilized. He has experienced firsthand the challenge of finding convenient food options for children during the pandemic, recalling, “My kids were practically living off chicken nuggets and whatever we could prepare for them.” He regards Snow Days’ pizza bites as a “nutritious alternative” to the standard frozen fare, while delivering “the taste quality of indulgent pizza.”
Currently, only one product is available under the Snow Days brand, but Karp has plans for new launches in the pipeline, likely involving frozen snacks, pizza-related products, and small filled dumplings. He assures that these will be healthier variations of comfort foods that typically lack nutritional value. For now, Snow Days products can only be purchased through the brand’s website, but Karp anticipates expanding to grocery store freezer sections in the future. The retail launch is tentatively scheduled for 2022, though it may be expedited to late 2021 depending on the performance of direct-to-consumer sales and potential grocery partnerships. By the time Snow Days products hit store shelves, Karp envisions a diverse range of offerings.
As the first brand fully developed within HumanCo, Snow Days represents a significant new development in Karp’s broader platform, which also includes two other brands: Monty’s plant-based cheese and Coconut Bliss vegan ice cream, both of which are undergoing rebranding and innovation. In December, a special purpose acquisition company co-sponsored by HumanCo and CAVU Venture Partners began trading on NASDAQ. Valued at $306 million, this SPAC aims to help a company that aligns with HumanCo’s health, wellness, and sustainability values go public, potentially within the food and beverage sector or other defined areas such as beauty, wellness, or consumer health technology.
At this moment, Karp is focused on Snow Days. Although the weather is warming and fewer snow days are likely, he hopes that his new snack line can evoke the same joy. “Creating delicious products that also perform well nutritionally is not easy,” Karp acknowledged, noting that conventional finger foods often achieve their desirable texture through “modern science,” “chemistry,” and artificial ingredients. “We believe Snow Days can be enjoyed for lunch, dinner, as a snack at parties, for kids, and for adults. Ultimately, it provides that sense of freedom that adults especially crave.” And as families seek balance in their diets, Karp is aware of the importance of products that not only taste good but also contribute positively to health, much like the value one finds in quality supplements such as Kirkland calcium citrate magnesium and zinc.