Brands Briefing: Bag charms are the hot new trend in branded CPG merch

Bag charms have become popular among young consumers in recent years as a way to personalize their accessories and reflect their interests on the bag they carry every day. On Etsy, searches for purse bag charms are up 27% in the last three months, compared to the same period a year ago, the marketplace told Modern Retail. In May, toy company Funko said bag charms and pins drove double-digit growth for its bag brand Loungefly.

Now, more food companies and restaurants are in the mix, as part of a broader push into branded merch. These players are making their own bag charms, alongside merchandise like hats, sweatshirts and socks. For companies like Kraft and Cava, branded merchandise is a way to position themselves more as lifestyle brands and as companies attuned to what’s popular in culture. It’s also a way for these companies to spark conversations around new products or menu items and, ideally, get customers thinking about their brands outside of mealtime.

Cava saw an uptick in sales and traffic the day it launched its yellow bag charm this summer, the restaurant told Modern Retail. Customers could nab the product after making an in-restaurant purchase at participating Cava locations on Aug. 27. “It becomes a new reason for people to come to Cava,” said Silmo Bonomi, Cava’s vp of brand and creative.

Bonomi said Cava ran out of its bag charms and also saw people posting about them online. Cava’s own Instagram post about the drop garnered nearly 2,000 likes, with comments such as, “Plotting how to leave work for this” and “POV u get the cava mini bag keychain and you make it your whole personality, guilty 😌🛍️.” Even other brands commented, with Bubble asking, “How many bbq pita chips can it fit?”

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The Cava mini bag keychain debuted a year after Cava gave out pita chip plushie bag charms as a promotion for its Hot Harissa Meal. Designed in partnership with former Cava team member Thaddeus W. Coates (who is also a New York City-based creator), the bag charms came in four characters: Peter Chip, Jimmy Harissa, Garlic Gus and Sweet Sammy.

Cava is open to making more bag charms in the future, if customers ask for them, Bonomi told Modern Retail. “We look very closely, in terms of trends and what the guests [say] about us, and it just [felt] like the right thing to do,” he said. “The same level of care and craft we put into our food, we want to put in our merch.”

Social content, which can help drive “fear of missing out,” is powering other bag-charm launches. Kraft Natural Cheese has only launched Pocket Parm in two cities so far — Los Angeles and Orlando — and it doesn’t sell the product online. But social-media content has helped drive excitement, said Dhriti Batra, director of Kraft Natural Cheese at Lactalis Heritage Dairy.

So far, cheese fans have been able to grab Pocket Parm for free by going to a truck that the brand dispatches around the country. Fans can get the staple Parmesan flavor, as well as three new ones: Tomato Basil Parmesan, Garlic Herb Parmesan and Cheddar. Kraft Natural Cheese posts on social media about where its truck will be and works with influencers on content.

Kraft Natural Cheese’s initial Pocket Parm Instagram post drew more than 48,000 likes, and posts about its truck rack up hundreds of views. “We have people saying, ‘Don’t ghost me. I’ll be there!'” Batra told Modern Retail. “We have people sending friends [to the truck]. We have kids sending their parents.” The brand plans to send the truck to more locations in 2027.

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Kraft Natural Cheese developed Pocket Parm to speak to “the power of flavor on the move,” Batra said. “There are a lot of occasions of consumers wanting to cook, wanting to eat better, but at the same time, wanting to spend less time in the kitchen, wanting fast meals … but wanting to hit on everything, especially flavor.”

With Pocket Parm, people can take cheese with them to a late-night study session or on a business trip, she said. The product is shelf-stable until opened; the company does not recommend refilling Pocket Parm.

Kraft Natural Cheese is also using its Pocket Parm charms to test demand for its new flavors before doing nationwide rollouts in 2027. “The idea would be to drive consumers to the full-sized bottle,” Batra said.

Branded merchandise has been all the rage for companies ranging from Grillo’s Pickles to the grocery store H-E-B. In 2021, Liquid Death sold $3 million of branded merch, including $14 dog toys and $500 mini-fridges. In 2023, Organic Valley launched a store with 13 different items, including shirts. It did so as “a platform for people to really express their values and support for small family farms by, literally, wearing it on their sleeves,” Jaclyn Cardin, then-chief brand officer at Organic Valley, previously told Modern Retail.

The rise of CPG bag charms also comes at a bustling time for co-branded food merch drops. This summer, Gap released a line of hoodies, tees and accessories with New York City favorite Los Tacos No.1. Meanwhile, Dunkin’ partnered with influencer Chelsea Parke on a line of drinks, sweatshirts and accessories tied to her clothing line, Parke.

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