Twinkies Are Back! Now What?

When Hostess Twinkies return to store shelves next month, they’ll epitomize one of branding’s rarest feats: a return from the dead. But while the snack’s resurgence (courtesy of a $410 million fire-sale buyout by Apollo Global Management) will doubtless make snack hounds happy, the legendary brand still has its work cut out for it. Indeed, according to observers, after the hoopla fades, Twinkies may well face a kind of branding Catch-22. Hardcore fans aren’t enough in number to sustain the snack food in perpetuity, while its troublesome nutrition label (220 mg of sodium in one cake?) may well be a hard sell for younger, health-conscious buyers.