What Sort of Shelf Life Do Healthy Golf Snacks Have in the Game?

Hally Leadbetter thought about it for years before confiding to friend Amanda Balionis during a turkey trot in 2024 that spurred her to take action.

Zack Korbin started thinking about it while he was in college at the University of Wisconsin but it wasn’t until his roommate was diagnosed with Crohn’s disease when he decided to do something about it.

Alex Newell and George Bevan thought about it after a decade-plus each working in sports marketing and the food industry, respectively.

While all of these entrepreneurs had their aha moment at varying times, they all came to the same conclusion: Why aren’t there any healthy golf snacks?

“Going to so many golf courses growing up and as now through my day job as I call it, I was just like, ‘Man, why isn’t there a healthy snack that I can rely on that I know that’s going to be at golf courses?’” Leadbetter said. “I know there’s going to be hamburgers and hot dogs. I know there’s going to be candy, but I’m just like praying for some sort of half-healthy snack.

“So I started thinking, ‘OK, if that did exist, what would that be?’”

Leadbetter has grown up in golf. Her father, David, is one of the game’s premier instructors through his work with Nick Faldo, Ernie Els, Lydia Ko, Michelle Wie West and Nick Price. Hally grew up in a house on the 16th hole at Lake Nona Golf & Country Club in Orlando; World Golf Hall of Famer Annika Sörenstam currently owns the property.

A prominent golf voice in her own right as a broadcaster, host, producer and content creator, Leadbetter can be seen working for Golf Digest and CBS Sports. A Nike and Callaway ambassador, Leadbetter also founded Better Co., a creative agency and production company built to connect with today’s golfer.

She’s spent years scouring snack carts, halfway houses and pro shops for something healthier than the typical grab-and-go menu headlined by hot dogs, hamburgers, PB&J sandwiches, chicken salad wraps and candy bars.

Having toiled with the idea of creating a golfer-friendly healthy snack for a while, Leadbetter finally confessed to her CBS Sports colleague during a pre-Thanksgiving 5K she wanted to launch a brand, didn’t know where to start and most likely wouldn’t go through with it.

Whether it was luck or fate, Balionis recommended Leadbetter talk to friend Alex Thompson, co-founder of food consulting company The Lasagna Box. With a food industry and CPG expert now at her side, Leadbetter continued to build her support team with golf-focused nutritionist Amy O’Donnell and food scientists helping concoct a clean, no-junk energy ball made for golfers.

Packaged like a box of golf balls with three protein balls per sleeve, Bunchies launched at the 2026 PGA Show in Orlando. Leadbetter has leveraged her life on the links to help bring the brand into top clubs and resorts around the country including Pinehurst, Pebble Beach and Streamsong as well as in all 110 Golf Galaxy locations nationwide.

Bunchies is buoyed by investors including former Tropicana Brands Group CEO Glen Walter, Five Iron co-founder and CEO Jared Solomon and Chris Keiser of Bandon Dunes and Sand Valley. Bunchies is set to hit its seed round target of $750,000 in the next few weeks, according to Leadbetter, who also hopes to find a strategic partner to match that amount to fund further growth and expansion into being a snack brand for people on the go. Unsurprisingly, golf remains priority No. 1 for Leadbetter.

“We’ve just hit the tip of the iceberg when it comes to focusing on golf,” she said. “I’m excited to double down on that because I’m realizing there is so much potential in this industry. Even speaking to other entrepreneurs in the golf space about expanding beyond golf and they say, ‘No, I’m not done becoming as big as I can in golf.’

“So having heard that from people in other sectors of the business, I’m excited to sort of apply that to us to be the kind of go-to snack for golf.”

While Bunchies is set to celebrate its first anniversary in three months, two new competitors have entered the space, looking to give golfers even more healthy options on the course.

Full Turn Nutrition performance bars were developed to give golfers better fuel on the course. Founded by Korbin with consultation from BumbleBar co-founders Liz and Glenn Ward, each Full Turn performance bar features 20g protein, 5g collagen, 6g fiber and 100mg L-theanine with no refined sugar or preservatives to offer steady energy and calm focus.

Going course-to-course like a young Mark Cuban armed with samples, the 24-year-old Korbin’s products can be found at nine courses, primarily in the Washington, D.C./DMV area where he’s from.

Full Turn sold out its pilot run of 5,000 bars in May. Currently self-funded, Korbin said he will seek outside investment for future production runs as well as growth and expansion as he also targets college golf teams and indoor simulators and lounges with fall in full swing and winter around the corner.

“The team is just me but I have some contract help,” Korbin said. “ChatGPT was just starting to come out, so I was just kind of going back and forth with it like, ‘Here’s my idea. What could we possibly do? What would ingredients look like? How would this look?’

“So I started to do it in my kitchen and I quickly realized that this was not going to work. It was a lot more complicated than I thought of just going to the grocery store and putting stuff together.”

Golf’s health kick, and potential market gap, isn’t limited to the U.S. Across the pond in the UK, Newell and Bevan are taking action against a lack of healthy on-course snacks by launching Caddies & Birdies in August.

Speaking to golfers who typically have to stock up on snacks before getting to the course due to lack of healthy options, the duo started their brand with trail mix. Available in original and dark chocolate, fruit and nut, these 80g resealable pouches feature ingredients such as peanuts, raisins, dates, sunflower seeds, Brazil nuts, toasted coconut and cashews.

Caddies & Birdies began distribution through pro shops, clubhouses, halfway houses and online. Their trail mix is now stocked in approximately 15 golf venues across the UK, including at Woodhall Spa Golf Club, the official National Golf Centre and headquarters of England Golf. The brand received a nice boost when World No. 8 Charley Hull was seen on TV snacking away on their trail mix during the 2026 Solheim Cup.

The current goal, according to Newell, is perfecting proof of concept in order to grow Caddies & Birdies into a line of golf-specific snacks and beverages.

“We saw an opportunity to create great-tasting, convenient snacks and drinks with golfers in mind, backed by a brand they could recognize and trust,” Newell said. “We launched with trail mix made from nuts, seeds and dried fruit. We don’t position it as a performance product—it’s simply a good snack made with recognizable ingredients and designed for the practicalities of being on the course for several hours.

“Over time, we want Caddies & Birdies to become a natural part of a golfer’s routine and a brand they look for before heading to the first tee.”

It’s no coincidence each of these brands entered the market this year.

More than one-third of the U.S. population age 5+ played golf, followed golf on TV/online, read about the game or listened to a golf-related podcast in 2025, according to the National Golf Foundation. A record 48.1 million Americans age 6+ played on- and off-course golf last year.

Not only is golf more popular than ever, but so is being mindful of product ingredients and sourcing.

Nearly eight in 10 U.S. adults say they are either “very concerned” (31 percent) or “somewhat concerned” (47 percent) about the safety of ingredients in products such as food, cosmetics and personal care items, according to a 2026 YouGov survey. Half of Americans (50 percent) say they are more concerned about harmful substances than they were a year ago. Nearly 60 percent say they have avoided certain products or brands while 39 percent have switched to products perceived as more “natural” or “clean.”

Sounds like a recipe for success for healthy golf snack brands.

“If people are trying to take care of themselves, they’re realizing it’s not just the physical activity, but it’s the hand-to-mouth activity as well,” said Leslie Bonci, a sports dietician and nutritionist who has worked with the Kansas City Chiefs, Pittsburgh Pirates, WNBA and other sports teams and properties. “People are going to be more selective, so that’s created demand.”

Bonci, founder of Active Eating Advice, said golfers should prioritize getting the right amount of carbohydrates, protein and electrolytes to properly fuel for the duration of a round. Eating too much or heavy foods can impact one’s game whereas not consuming enough liquids, especially to help digest those heavier foods, can spell trouble as well.

It’s also no coincidence all three brands are utilizing similar strategies by prioritizing green-grass accounts as well as online DTC. Leadbetter’s Bunchies have retail distribution in Golf Galaxy, while the other snack brands aren’t prioritizing that route (yet).

But getting into big-box retailers like Dick’s Sporting Goods, PGA Tour Superstore and Golf Galaxy doesn’t necessarily guarantee success.

“First, you have to be able to win shelf space,” said Sam Kornblum, whose Consult With K helps smaller and niche golf and sports brands get into retailers. “But really that’s half the battle, right? Once you get in, you have to keep selling.

“When you sell retail, you’re talking wholesale, so immediately somebody’s brain goes, ‘Well, why would I sell it for less?’ That’s the challenge. Now, DTC has better margins, better consumer relationship directly with an ad. But you can also have challenges with that because customer acquisition costs can become very expensive.”

While the golf industry is currently hungry for better-for-you snacks, these startups face an uphill battle as they jostle for customer attention and dollars in a niche market. Shifting customer habits. Limited space in big-box retailers where even another’s failure can be detrimental to your brand. Necessary capital to keep up with demand and growth. The looming threat of established, million-dollar industry titans throwing their hat in the ring.

But like in a round of golf, you have to keep swinging.

“At the end of the day, I’m just a 24-year-old guy into health and wellness,” Korbin said. “I love golf. I’m a businessman. And I just kind of combined all those things together to make a product that I thought other people would enjoy and would help them on the course.”