Mac-and-Cheese Disruptor Goodles to Be Acquired by Barilla
The maker of flavors like Here Comes Truffle will remain as a stand-alone brand within Barilla Group
- Italian pasta maker Barilla Group has agreed to acquire Goodles, a nutrient-dense mac-and-cheese brand.
- Goodles was valued at $88 million after a 2023 funding round and turned its first profit in 2024.
- Goodles will continue to operate from its California headquarters with Chief Executive Jen Zeszut at the helm.
The Italian pasta maker Barilla Group has agreed to acquire Goodles, the nutrient-dense macaroni-and-cheese brand known for its colorful boxes and cheekily named flavors. Terms of the deal weren’t disclosed.
Santa Cruz, Calif.-based Goodles was valued at $88 million after a 2023 funding round, according to PitchBook. It turned its first profit in 2024.
Goodles introduced its take on mac and cheese online in 2021, marketing its products as “Noodles, Gooder” by virtue of their protein and fiber content. Since then, it has trotted out flavors such as Here Comes Truffle, added a variety of healthier-for-you pasta noodles and expanded distribution to retailers such as Target and Whole Foods.
The company garnered 7.8% of U.S. spending on shelf-stable macaroni and cheese in the 12 months through the end of June, up from 0.8% in the same period three years earlier, according to consumer data firm Numerator. Kraft Heinz’s Kraft Mac & Cheese meanwhile saw market share decline to 36.6% from 42.2%, while sibling brand Velveeta fell to 18.9% from 21.6%. The figures, derived from an app where consumers share their shopping data, cover all sales channels and retailers except direct-to-consumer sales.
But Goodles sees itself expanding the mac-and-cheese market, not just taking share from incumbents. Mac and cheese generates an estimated $2.1 billion to $2.3 billion in sales of shelf-stable products each year in the U.S., according to data firm Consumer Edge, which analyzed purchase data from point-of-sale systems.
Eighty percent of Goodles sales are from consumers who hadn’t eaten mac and cheese in the past, or who are buying more than they had before, not from people who switched from other brands, according to co-founder and Chief Executive Jen Zeszut.
Goodles’s rise mirrors broader shifts in the U.S. dry pasta market toward healthier, organic and gluten-free options. “This shift has encouraged brands to rethink traditional recipes and ingredient sourcing, investing in products that align with health trends, allergies and dietary restrictions,” said Arielle Rose, an analyst at IBISWorld, in a March report.
Despite its growth so far, Goodles’s relatively small size was constraining further expansion, according to Zeszut.
“Ninety-two percent of the U.S. population hasn’t even tried Goodles yet, so we’re just getting started,” Zeszut said, wearing a pasta-noodle choker during a Zoom call to discuss the deal. “It was really either us choosing to get big on our own and raising a bunch of money and hiring a bunch of people,” she said, or finding a larger partner with more resources.
Zeszut said she met Barilla’s leadership team at a Formula One race last year but didn’t talk business.
Behind the scenes, however, Barilla said it had been following Goodles’s momentum the past few years. Barilla reached out in June to express interest in an acquisition.
Guido Barilla, chairman of Barilla Group, in a statement said the company was impressed by the Goodles brand, the products’ quality and the company’s momentum.
Goodles will continue to operate from its headquarters, with Zeszut at the helm and all 73 employees retained.
“I know that consumers are going to probably be like, ‘Oh no, Goodles is going to get gutted” and worry that the ingredients will change, Zeszut said. “That’s totally natural. There’s many data points from many other companies to make them feel that way, and the only thing we can say is, ‘Just watch us.’”
Barilla said the deal will close following regulatory approval.