Backyard Smoker Becomes National Snack Brand — Now Shelved at Costco After Hitting Roughly $500,000 a Month

Jared Drinkwater turned a weekend experiment into a retail phenomenon: a wood-smoked chip that launched in 2019 and now appears on shelves in thousands of stores, including Costco. The Dallas entrepreneur says his company is pulling in about a half-million dollars each month and is aiming to top $20 million in revenue within the next 18 months after moving from a side project to a full-time operation.

Drinkwater spent two decades in marketing roles at major consumer food companies before testing the snack that became Low and Slow. He worked on mainstream brands and later led marketing at a sports-gear portfolio company. He stepped away from that corporate post in 2022 to focus exclusively on building the snack business he had been tinkering with in his backyard.

The idea began over dinner in 2019, when a conversation about barbecue led Drinkwater to challenge conventional chip flavors. Rather than chase sauce-inspired seasoning, he sought to capture the aroma and taste of wood smoke. He started by applying a rib rub to potato slices and running them through his backyard smoker. Family feedback and an absence of existing smoked snacks in the market convinced him to pursue a commercial product.

Scaling required expertise Drinkwater didn’t have. He recruited Mike Zbuchalski, a former R&D leader at Frito-Lay and long-time snack innovator, to help translate backyard methods into a process that could produce shelf-stable, smoked products at scale. After roughly two years of experimentation — and a lot of hickory — the partners developed a manufacturing approach that preserved smoky flavor without compromising shelf life or safety, a hurdle that had kept others from trying the category.

Building the brand was the next major investment. Early costs included several tens of thousands for identity and packaging work that needed to signal a barbecue experience on grocery aisles. The product’s positioning as a wood-smoked snack, coupled with distribution deals, helped it move beyond local markets into national retailers. Drinkwater credits the combination of product novelty and familiar barbecue cues for rapid wholesale pickup.

Industry observers say Low and Slow is tapping into broader shifts in snack buying: shoppers are looking for authentic flavor profiles and stories that feel artisanal, even from national chains. A food-industry analyst who requested anonymity called the concept “a smart niche play” that benefits from both novelty and scale potential. Drinkwater now faces the typical next-stage choices — expand SKUs, widen production capacity and protect intellectual property — as he tries to turn a backyard experiment into a lasting national brand.