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PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US?
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PowerBar gels and gel blasts have always been my favourite on-bike nutrition. Up here in Canada they've recently discontinued a bunch of gel flavours and the gel blasts (we only ever had one flavour available). My local retailer is telling me he figures they're getting out of sport nutrition all together. Anyone know if that's true and if it's just in Canada or they're doing that in the US as well?
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [amos] [ In reply to ]
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Yep, I believe they're discontinuing all their Gels by the end of 2018!
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [amos] [ In reply to ]
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In favor of new products like the recently introduced beef jerky and nut combo bar.

Andrew Inkpen
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [amos] [ In reply to ]
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As long as they don't discontinue their bars I'm happy. Most convenient nutrition on the bike by far.
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [Grill] [ In reply to ]
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disagree, mainly because i cannot eat those things. They just sit in my throat and don't move down. learned years ago to not get powerbar bars. even worse in winter when xc skiing and can't bite a piece off the damn things without using a blowtorch
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [jeffp] [ In reply to ]
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Still the most convenient. What other bar on the market sticks to your top tube without danger of falling off regardless of road surface? ;)
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [amos] [ In reply to ]
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amos wrote:
PowerBar gels and gel blasts have always been my favourite on-bike nutrition. Up here in Canada they've recently discontinued a bunch of gel flavours and the gel blasts (we only ever had one flavour available). My local retailer is telling me he figures they're getting out of sport nutrition all together. Anyone know if that's true and if it's just in Canada or they're doing that in the US as well?

NIce exit strategy. Just quit? (eye roll) Is there more to the story?
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [Grill] [ In reply to ]
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Grill wrote:
Still the most convenient. What other bar on the market sticks to your top tube without danger of falling off regardless of road surface? ;)

I love chocolate power bars. Like a giant tootsie roll. I've had the flu the last week and about 50% of my meals have just been a chocolate powerbar. The other flavors? Meh. But they're still better than clif bars.

Dimond Bikes Superfan
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [ericlambi] [ In reply to ]
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Um... why not just buy a Tootsie Roll? Probably cheaper.
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [jstonebarger] [ In reply to ]
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Hello jstonbarger and All,

Awwwwwww .... PowerBars are part of triathlon history

What's next?

Kona race going to Bejing?

Maybe it will get spun off.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PowerBar

With Mike McCollum, the PowerBar company was founded by Brian Maxwell, a Canadian athlete and entrepreneur and Maxwell's girlfriend, Jennifer Biddulph, a nutritionist and distance runner who later became his wife, in their kitchen. They used $55,000 in cash to launch the company in 1986 in Berkeley, California. This was the first "energy bar" for use during competition by endurance athletes, such as ultra marathoners, and cyclists.[1] They eventually acquired a headquarters building in downtown Berkeley.

The company eventually reached $150 million in sales before being purchased by Nestlé in 2000 for $375 million.[1] In February 2007, PowerBar moved its headquarters from Berkeley, California to the Nestlé headquarters in Glendale, California. With the move came the hiring of an entirely new marketing team.[citation needed]

On February 3, 2014, Post Holdings announced it had reached an agreement to acquire PowerBar, Musashi and related worldwide assets from Nestlé.[2]




Cheers, Neal

+1 mph Faster
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [gotriit] [ In reply to ]
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gotriit wrote:
Yep, I believe they're discontinuing all their Gels by the end of 2018!

well that sucks. I preferred their gels over others because of the higher amount of Sodium.
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [ericlambi] [ In reply to ]
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ericlambi wrote:
But they're still better than clif bars.
No way -- the Clif nut butter-filled bars are like buttah!
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [amos] [ In reply to ]
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I like that the PowerBar gels have a thinner consistency than other gels - a lot easier to go down and very easy to mix into flasks. I guess I'll be stocking up!

I agree on the top tube thing that someone else mentioned. Stick half a bar on there to start the bike in longer races. :)

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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [jeffp] [ In reply to ]
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jeffp wrote:
disagree, mainly because i cannot eat those things. They just sit in my throat and don't move down. learned years ago to not get powerbar bars. even worse in winter when xc skiing and can't bite a piece off the damn things without using a blowtorch

I thought their bars actually were really nice, the PE bars, as they were really the only bar that does not melt, and is absorbed super fast IME. You are supposed to keep them in your back pocket while riding... It softens them up ;)


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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [Grill] [ In reply to ]
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Grill wrote:
As long as they don't discontinue their bars I'm happy. Most convenient nutrition on the bike by far.
I loved their berry blast or fruit smoothie bars but they are nowhere to be found anymore. I figured something was up.

I love the gels though because they're so easy to consume. I usually alternate between BOOM! gels and Powerbar... good for Boom I guess...
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [gotriit] [ In reply to ]
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Huh! I got some discount code by email and went to their website to buy some gels last week. As others have mentioned, the consistency of their gels is pretty loose compared to others and I preferred that for racing. But there were only like four flavors and none of the ones I was interested in. At the time I thought, well, some flavors temporarily out of stock. Maybe not temporary...
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [amos] [ In reply to ]
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What, so do PowerBar make any general consumer items, or are they just winding the whole brand down? Seems like an odd decision to me...

I like the Ride bars and the gels, but those Energize bars that they have at Ironman events in Europe are just total garbage.
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [awenborn] [ In reply to ]
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awenborn wrote:
What, so do PowerBar make any general consumer items, or are they just winding the whole brand down? Seems like an odd decision to me...

I like the Ride bars and the gels, but those Energize bars that they have at Ironman events in Europe are just total garbage.

I think they're streamlining their products to match the needs of the "On the Go" fitness consumers, such as protein shakes and other products that are found in grocery stores and 7-eleven.
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [giorgitd] [ In reply to ]
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giorgitd wrote:
Huh! I got some discount code by email and went to their website to buy some gels last week. As others have mentioned, the consistency of their gels is pretty loose compared to others and I preferred that for racing. But there were only like four flavors and none of the ones I was interested in. At the time I thought, well, some flavors temporarily out of stock. Maybe not temporary...

From what I remember, they are locked into a contract until 2019 with NYRR (especially NYC Marathon) to supply their races with Gels. So they may have produced enough gels to supply those events and sell some on the side. But again, I could be wrong. I haven't heard much yet from what direction they are taking things. I believe our stores only carry select flavors now, and those flavors are getting less and less.
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [nealhe] [ In reply to ]
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nealhe wrote:

With Mike McCollum, the PowerBar company was founded by Brian Maxwell, a Canadian athlete and entrepreneur and Maxwell's girlfriend, Jennifer Biddulph, a nutritionist and distance runner who later became his wife, in their kitchen.

I guess there are stranger places to get married...

---------------------------------------------------------------------
Some are born to move the world to live their fantasies...

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http://www.mjolnircycles.com/
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [awenborn] [ In reply to ]
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From the sounds of it they're not winding the brand down but are shifting their focus to more of the Whole Foods all natural bar crowd and away from sport nutrition products (aka gels, gel blasts and bars that stick to top tubes).
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [awenborn] [ In reply to ]
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awenborn wrote:
What, so do PowerBar make any general consumer items, or are they just winding the whole brand down? Seems like an odd decision to me...

I like the Ride bars and the gels, but those Energize bars that they have at Ironman events in Europe are just total garbage.

The Powerbar contract with Ironman Europe was last extended from 2015-2017. I heard it was not renewed for 2018 but do not know what company is replacing them.
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [Rocky M] [ In reply to ]
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NIce exit strategy. Just quit? (eye roll) Is there more to the story?


I don't know the full story, but in talking to my contacts on the brand side there has been a massive shift with the larger brands in the sports nutrition category.

With both PowerBar and CLIF, despite getting their start with endurance sports, and I know for PowerBar, specifically in triathlon many years ago ( a bit of a history for PB that I blogged about back in 2014 - http://stevefleck.blogspot.ca/...r-early-history.html ) the endurance sports market (runners, cyclists & triathletes) is now a SMALL market for them. I'm told less than 25% for both companies. 75% and growing rapidly for them, is the "healthy snack" category, where their main retail partners are large grocery store chains, and businesses such as WalMart and even Amazon! Small independent running, cycling and triathlon stores are now WAY down on their list of priorities.

To hear about cut-backs in SKU's is not really that surprising.


Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [HuffNPuff] [ In reply to ]
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HuffNPuff wrote:
The Powerbar contract with Ironman Europe was last extended from 2015-2017. I heard it was not renewed for 2018 but do not know what company is replacing them.

I can't say I'm disappointed to hear that and perhaps therein lies the problem for PowerBar. It'll be interesting to see who replaces them.

As to the sports vs healthy snack distinction, I wouldn't be surprised if the latter has effectively become the former, in that people partaking in sports are shifting their eating habits away from highly-processed foodstuffs to more natural alternatives.
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Re: PowerBar discontinued in Canada, what about US? [Fleck] [ In reply to ]
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While understand that independent run/bike shops may be way down their list of priorities, why do they need to phase it out? They don't need to reinvent their gels at all and I don't think it's a market that they need to invest a ton of marketing into, they're pretty established in the category. All they have to do is keep making the stuff......maybe give the packaging a new look every 5 years.
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