10 Food Brands Killing It On TikTok (2022)

We’re listing the best food brands on TikTok, plus what food and drink brands can learn from these ‘fun’ food brands to become the next *trending* food brand.
Fanbytes | Food brands on TikTok | trending food brands | fun food brands

In 30 seconds:

  • Here is your round-up of the top food brands nailing it on TikTok right now.
  • We’ve got insider tips on what you should take away from each epic TikTok food brand.
  • Gen Z loves food brands. How can you get through to them on TikTok? We’ll take you through what gets them ordering.


The number of food brands on TikTok has soared. The food and beverage industry is highly visual, and brands have turned to TikTok – as an immensely popular video-sharing app – to flaunt their wares and get taste buds tingling.

TikTok has a large audience, hitting over a billion monthly active users last year. The majority (60%) of that audience is Gen Z, and they’ve got their eye on the tastier things in life. 23% of their wallet goes on eating and drinking, making them a prime target for food and beverage brands.

Trending food brands on TikTok have unlocked the Gen Z mindset. But how? 

Fun food brands nail TikTok

TikTokers go on the app to find entertaining or funny content, so keeping videos fresh and fun is the key to success. You have just 8 seconds to capture the attention of Gen Z, so the most successful content is short, snappy and reels them in quickly. On Tiktok, the fun food brands are the trending food brands. 

The pandemic saw food trends skyrocket on TikTok, with #cottagecore and intricate handmade focaccia recipe videos vying for space with viral hack to create whipped Dalgona coffee. Even Gordon Ramsay (yes, the one with the Michelin stars) created short videos to duet home cooks’ recipes on TikTok with the #RamsayReacts hashtag.

The reason all of these trends took off? They’re fun. All TikTok food brands should consider this, so they can start making content that’s piping hot. 

Trending food brands 2022: who’s killing it on TikTok?

What food brands are on TikTok? With a multitude of companies trying to be seen on the social media platform, let’s go through the top trending brands on the app and how they’re nailing their content. 

Food brand #1: Chipotle

Chipotle is food royalty when it comes to TikTok content. Chipotle chose TikTok as a priority because TikTok is Gen Z’s favourite social media platform, and 50% of their customers are zoomers. They also know Gen Z’s takeaway orders are of equal value to millennials’ orders – and that Gen Z ordered 3-4 times a week. 

How are they killing it?

Branded Hashtag Challenges

Chipotle introduced game-changing branded challenges on TikTok. Their first #ChipotleLidFlip challenge was based on an employee who was great at assembling burrito bowls. They reached out to Gen Z creators who were Chipotle fans, such as Youtuber David Dobrik (@DavidDobrik) to promote the challenge. These Chipotle superfans created a layer of authenticity. The challenge inspired 111k user-generated videos and led to Chipotle’s largest digital sales day ever.

Seeing the value in influencer-led branded challenges, they collaborated with Loren Gray (@lorengray) to promote a hashtag challenge called #GuacDance. They added incentive by giving away free guacamole all day. It resulted in 1.1 billion views on #GuacDance’s hashtag, 500m views on Loren Gray’s video and 800,000 portions of guacamole served. 

@chipotle We come in peace this National Burrito Day. See ya at the OG Chipotle on @Roblox on 4/7. #chipotle #roblox ♬ original sound - Chipotle

Looking to the future

Chipotle has most recently collaborated with Roblox. If you’re wondering what that is, check out our article: the Roblox metaverse, what it is and why Gen Z love it. The Mexican restaurant created an in-game experience where players can become an employee at a virtual Chipotle. They offered a free burrito IRL (in real life) for the first 100,000 people to play the mini-game and win. The video has already racked up 2.9 million views.  

Top tip: Whether through branded hashtag challenges or gaming collaborations, Chipotle nails interactivity. That’s a playful element that Gen Z loves: 55% of Gen Z say they’d like to be able to choose the plotline of the movie or TV show they’re streaming. They want to immerse themselves in experiences, so making your content interactive will help your food brand attract followers – and customers.

Food brand #2 Dunkin’

A poster child of fun food TikTok is Dunkin’ (formerly Dunkin’ Donuts). The “all-day coffee and donut destination” regularly goes viral on Tiktok. Its headline-grabbing social media antics have won it legions of fans  – and the brand is also known for having the “friendliest fandom” on the internet. 

How are they killing it?

Superstar influencer partnerships

Dunkin’ doesn’t just partner with big-name influencers: they make them part of their brand. As TikTok sensation Charli D’amelio (@charlidamelio) rose to fame, Dunkin’ products could often be seen organically in her videos. This gave the brand millions of free impressions, so they invited Charli to become a brand ambassador. In 2020, Dunkin’ released a drink named “the Charli” which was wildly popular. They followed up with Charli x Dunkin’ merch which also sold out.

@dunkin Want an opportunity to be in our new TV ad? Check back tomorrow to audition🎤📺#dunkincastingcall #dunkin ♬ Sunroof - Nicky Youre & dazy

Ground-up influencer campaigns

Dunkin’ recently turned to US-based TikTokers to front a major TV commercial. The brand used a Tiktok duet to ask TikTokers to join a casting call-style challenge, using the hashtag #dunkincastingcall. So far, the hashtag has garnered 7.3 million views: influencers keen to become the “next Charli D’Amelio” are joining in, further exploding the brand’s TikTok reach.

Top Tip:  Dunkin’ are masters of brand partnership cohesion, maximised through merchandise. The brand’s strategy with Charli D’Amelio is identical to their route with other brands: most recently, Dunkin Donuts partnered with makeup brand ELF cosmetics for highly sought-after limited-run products. Dunkin Donuts knows the benefit of keeping an ear to the ground with what’s popular on Tiktok and creating surprising partnerships. 

Food brand #3 Little Moons

In early 2021, there was one particular food brand that TikTokers couldn’t get off their minds. A viral TikTok craze for mochi saw independent food brand Little Moons propelled to stardom, with sales boosting 700% in a week. The brand is still dining out on TikTok to this day – so how did they do it?

How are they killing it?

Approaching TikTok like a consumer

Little Moons marketing director Ross Farquhar told The Grocer “ The process of creating TikTok content should be the exact opposite to other social media platforms”. The brand’s TikTok is spontaneous, allowing them to be relevant, and not always “brand safe”. Fanbytes Account Director Ocean Clarke says “Little Moons has really great consistency. It comes across as one real person doing all their content.” They behave like a true TikToker on the platform, rather than a formal brand presence – something TikTokers love.

Putting money behind the buzz

Little Moons were lucky to see an organic interest in their brand spike on the platform – but they didn’t let it fizzle out. Instead, the team made a quick and simple recreation of the “going on an adventure to big Tesco to find Little Moons” trend, and turned it into a paid ad. They received 6 million views and spurred thousands more Tiktokers to have a go at creating their own version of the video. 

Top tip: Little Moons knew they were lucky – and they were careful to show it. Whenever someone made a Tiktok video around their product, Little Moons thanked them. Little Moons also followed up by offering TikTok video posters free products as a thank you. This tactic led to users creating even more videos, creating a halo effect.

Food brand #4: Wanna Date?

Vegan, paleo-friendly date spread Wanna Date? was a newbie to the TikTok world and wanted to use their small budget to make a splash on the platform. They succeeded. The target audience for this food brand was young foodies, and since Gen Z has become focused on healthy eating, it’s clear that they’ve come to the right place. 

How are they killing it?

Influencer marketing

Wanna Date wanted Gen Z to fall in love with their brand. They set one specific goal: to make their spreads go viral. Almost half of Gen Zers have made a purchase decision based on an influencer’s recommendation. So it was time to see if creators could get the youngest generations to “wanna date”.

With a minimal budget, we suggested only using two influencers to maximise ROI. One was food and health/fitness-focused Katie Kelly (@girlwithgreenbeanie), and the other was a more general, comedic, lifestyle creator Anthony D. (@tooturnttony). The result? Over 6.6 million views and nearly 7,000 clicks to the Wanna Date website. Read more about how we made this food brand go viral here.

@girlwithgreenbeanie S➡️B Episode 8: Healthy Fudge Recipe using @wannadatespread 🤍 100% vegan with no sugar added! #cooking #fyp #healthyrecipes ♬ original sound - Katie Kelly

Innovation

On top of sharing their products through influencers, Wanna Date has mastered innovative recipes that appeal to the younger generation. The best food brands on TikTok show off their products and services in creative ways. Wanna Date flaunts its delicious spreads through original recipes and regular how-tos. 

Top tip: Make sure to find the right influencer for your brand. It’s essential to do your research and work with TikTok creators who genuinely care about your products. We use an in-house tool called Bytesights to pair brands to their ideal creators. What we loved about this campaign is that Wanna Date weren’t afraid to let influences have creative freedom: as a result, the videos were memorable and original – and drove great results.

Food Brand #5: Taco Bell

With 1.7 million followers, Taco Bell is definitely getting TikTok right. Known as one of the more fun food brands on the platform, they’ve gone down the authentic route with their TikTok content. And it works: over 43% of Gen Zers have eaten at Taco Bell in the last month. 

How are they killing it?

Keeping it casual

69% of Gen Z actively avoid ads, so Taco Bell has found a more casual way to get their message across. The Mexican fast-food restaurant recently featured in a trending song on TikTok. Das Racist’s Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell went viral on the app. Taco Bell embraced the comedy fuelling TikTokers’ love of the Mexican pizza fusion, even getting Doja Cat to create a song about the dish. Taking on subjects like this in a casual, fun and friendly manner makes Taco Bell’s feed feel on-point.

@doritos @tacobell what you think? 🤔 📸: @moribyan #cookingtiktok #recipes ♬ Lazy Sunday - Official Sound Studio

Freebies and collaborations

Taco Bell knows how to engage people. They have presented loads of offers like getting a free Doritos Locos Tacos when signing up as a new rewards member on the app. They use Tiktok to talk about these offers in a fun way, too. 

Top tip: Take a look at some top Gen Z influencers on TikTok and their content to give you ideas on what your brand should create. If you’re looking for more details on how you can harness the power of TikTok, you can download Our 2022 Tiktok Playbook For Challenger Food & Drink Brands to stay one step ahead. 

Food Brand #6: McVities

McVities are new to TikTok, but that hasn’t stopped them from building tons of engagement on the platform. Drumming up interest among the younger generations is one of the brand’s focuses, and TikTok is the ideal place to do it. 

How are they killing it?

Enlisting foodie influencers

We worked with McVities to create hype over their biscuits during autumn. We asked three top foodie influencers to create s’mores recipes using McVities biscuits. The campaign achieved 760,100 views from a small number of creators, a high level of post shares and great comments. Why? The recipes were simple to recreate and looked irresistible. 

Series-style content

We also worked with McVities to help them build engagement over Halloween. Working with two macro-influencers for this TikTok strategy, we tasked them to create series-style content that would drum up comments. With just two pieces of content, the campaign gained 1.25M video views, 287 shares and nearly 1.3k comments. Using series style content urges people to come back for more.

Top tip: McVities promoted their content during peak periods for their products, but balanced this with a content strategy that encouraged viewers to return. Food brands should likewise consider important beats throughout the year, and how to leverage these into long-term interest in (and follows to) your brand.

Food Brand #7: Gushers

Gushers has 2.7M likes and 278.4k followers, built through their fun, quirky approach to Tiktok content. Gushers’ primary strategy was to identify trends and participate organically. They shot their videos on iPhone, using native TikTok effects for a DIY vibe. Their goal was to create good content that people enjoyed, instead of ads.

How are they killing it?

Gen Z humour

Among the many TikTok Candy Trends in 2021 was the Gushers crunch wrap. This trend was made with a tongue-in-cheek feel and made the rounds. They just *got* Gen Z humour. Gushers’ first few videos gained an organic 12 million views over 4 weeks, growing the following from just 200 to over 150k. Comments from TikTokkers said that the brand ‘finally understood their humour’. 

@therealgushers What did I just watch? Gushers x @fruitbythefoot ♬ original sound - Gushers

Social causes

Gushers also recognised that Gen Z is the most diverse generation to date and deeply cares about social issues. 6 in 10 Gen Zs say that systemic racism is pretty or very widespread. Gushers have recently championed black voices through their new hashtag #blackvoicescreategems and had 4 young black creators inspire change and raise over $400,000 for the NAACP. Gen Z cares about the social causes brands help. 

Top tip: Authenticity with social causes is essential. Be completely transparent about what your brand intends to do for a particular charity before putting out promotional content.

Food brand #8: Idahoan Foods

Idahoan Foods produces high quality, instant mashed potato products. They recognized that during lockdown, food content was incredibly popular on TikTok. We delivered a campaign for awareness and sales in the Gen Z market.

How are they killing it?

Dance challenges

Idahoan Foods wanted to get TikTokers to actively *use* their products. We choreographed a dance challenge using a custom sound. The challenge had all the elements of a viral trend: it was easy to learn and fun to replicate, with a catchy, ownable tune. But it also puts the brand’s product front and centre. Because the trend required the use of Idahoan Food’s products, we knew any user-generated content (UGC) was helping their cause.

Organic content that blends in

The second part of our campaign featured influencers eating their mashed potato products in organic creative videos. Influencers had full creative control (after all, they know their audience best). Their sponsored posts blended in seamlessly and gained 14 million views, with a 20% engagement rate (well above TikTok’s industry standard). Our sound reached an incredible 49.2k plays, and Idahoan Foods gained 3.7k followers.

Top Tip: Our key strategies were using a custom sound that was catchy and upbeat. We used an easy-to-learn ‘mash out’ dance in our challenge, so it was easy for users to make their own videos (they created over 200 of them). Above all, the campaign blended right into TikTok. 

Food brand #9: F’Real

For non-US readers who may not be familiar, F’real sells milkshakes. Their goal was brand relevance with Gen Z, and they’ve more than managed this on TikTok: the brand has over 800k followers, 45M views and 14.8M likes on TikTok. 

How are they killing it?

Maintaining an organic presence

F’Real’s aim was to create organic trends on TikTok. This is partly because, prior to joining the platform, the brand was already the subject of an organic TikTok trend: #frealmilkshake was taking over users’ For You Pages as TikTokers attempted to DIY the brand’s products. Upon joining the platform, F’Real engaged with commenters and made themselves relatable. This built great brand sentiment, as TikTokers saw the brand as authentic and playful.

@thebentist Braces life hack!! 👀🤫 @therealfreal #ad #lifehack #freal #braces #foryou ♬ original sound - The Bentist

Creating ‘life-hacks’ content

One of their most-watched videos on TikTok is F’Real’s ‘braces life hack’ where a dentist talks about how much they love sweets. Braces make eating these foods difficult, so F’real poised their milkshakes as the ‘hack’ to get them in milkshake form. This tactic yielded 3.3 million views on their video, and actually lifted sales by 7.1% per month. 

Top Tip: The key strategy is that F’real demonstrated how their brand could actually be useful rather than simply asking people to buy milkshakes. They also capitalised on the popularity of ‘life-hack’ content on TikTok, so it’s very watchable. 

Food brand #10 Doritos

Doritos are easily one of the most fun food brands on TikTok. You’ll regularly see the same faces on the brand’s feed  – Doritos staffers who have become brand mascots in themselves. It makes Dorito’s Tiktok profile a strong brand hub that’s supported by great influencers and wider user-generated content.

How are they killing it?

Branded filters

Doritos are not afraid of a branded TikTok filter. With examples including “flaming hot” (where AR flames come out of a user’s mouth) and gamified branded filter, “StackSTAX” (where users move their head to “stack” Doritos), there’s always something fun for TikTokers to use. 83% of Tiktokers create their own videos, so anything fun that helps them do this is a great step for generating UGC.

Behind the scenes content

From serialised content for product launches (examples here and here), to self-deprecating, self-referential videos, the Doritos social team features heavily to create a behind-the-scenes feel. TikTok followers will see aspects of the Doritos brand that they won’t see anywhere else. And, as Fanbytes’ Ocean points out “It’s pretty silly stuff – which is perfect for a TikTok audience, as that’s exactly what they want to see.”

Top top: Creating Gen Z dream jobs is a viral marketing trend, and Doritos tapped this recently by using TikTok to find an official ‘Flavour Confirmer’ – someone who would taste Dorito chips for $100 a day for one month. The job listing was launched via influencer Adam W (@adamw). It’s a campaign that pairs perfectly with the brand’s Tiktok presence, where staff are the stars.

10 best food brands on TikTok in 2022

  1. Chipotle
  2. Dunkin’
  3. Little Moons
  4. Wanna Date
  5. Taco Bell
  6. McVities
  7. Gushers
  8. Idahoan Foods
  9. F’Real
  10. Doritos

Could your brand be up in that list? Get in contact to make sure your food brand is doing everything it can to unlock success on TikTok in 2022.

The icing on the cake

Is TikTok good for food brands? Answer: Yes, if you know what you’re doing. These brands are experts in grabbing attention on TikTok. But with all the food trends, quirky content and product videos, there is one common thread between these fantastic brands: they’re true to themselves. 

Gen Z are bright. They see through sales pitches. Making your content relate to them is how you get through to them. So, take inspiration from these food brands and build a brilliant TikTok marketing strategy. 

If that seems like too much to chew, enlist the experts. We are TikTok pros and know exactly what gets Gen Z’s mouths watering. So get in touch and see how we can make your TikTok marketing campaign a piece of cake. 


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