Unreal Snacks Turns Unlimited Chocolate Into a Market Test

By Daniel Okafor

Unreal Snacks reaches 35,000 stores across the U.S. and Canada, according to CEO Kevin McCarthy, making it America’s largest better-for-you chocolate brand.

Under Unreal’s unlimited chocolate policy, employees can buy as much chocolate as they want from the company and its competitors. McCarthy said: “We’ll do close to a ton of chocolate this year.”

McCarthy joined in 2014 at 22, fresh off a congressional campaign, with no food industry experience. Unreal had three employees, including McCarthy. The company launched in 2011 and expanded faster than its infrastructure could support.

During the How Success Happens interview, the host ate an embarrassing amount of peanut butter cups on camera and broke McCarthy’s experience into five bite-sized lessons.

Why did Unreal shrink from 34,000 stores to 38?

The reset gave McCarthy a practical assignment: replace a broad store footprint with a smaller operation that management could support and learn from quickly.

“The company used to be in 34,000 stores,” McCarthy said. When he arrived, Unreal relaunched with products in 38 stores.

“We were trying to do way too much way too quickly, and we weren’t learning at an appropriate pace,” McCarthy said. His response was to shrink, master the basics and rebuild one step at a time. His first lesson was blunt: slow growth when it outpaces the company’s capacity to learn.

How does unlimited chocolate sharpen product decisions?

The policy combines unrestricted purchasing authority, structured feedback and group debate, allowing routine market observations to shape the company’s product choices more directly each time.

After buying chocolate, employees report back on taste and shelf presence. Debates can include thousands of samples, including tests of whether a peanut butter center should feel gritty, crunchy or smooth. McCarthy described them as lively internal debates.

Every employee gets a voice, McCarthy said, “but then we pick a path and we move forward.” The process turns employee curiosity into a recurring source of product feedback.

Why does taste matter more than advertising?

McCarthy’s test is commercial rather than cosmetic: a better-for-you product must deliver enough pleasure to generate a second purchase without relying on paid advertising alone.

“The bite is the moment of truth,” McCarthy said. “When you have a big name like Unreal, you need to deliver on the taste.”

He tied that standard to Unreal’s high repeat-purchase rate. Loyal customers, he said, became “the best marketing engine of anything.” McCarthy’s second lesson follows directly: make sure the product earns a second purchase before spending a dollar on ads.

What does a big retail win change?

McCarthy’s leadership philosophy centers on staying level: “You can never get too excited. You can never get too down,” he said.

He applied the same caution to favorable news: “I don’t like surprises that are bad. I also don’t like surprises that are good because we’re probably not prepared for them.”

A major retailer adds distribution and operating obligations at the same time, so McCarthy treats every favorable surprise as evidence that execution capacity may soon be tested. McCarthy said landing a big retailer like Costco was worth celebrating, but it also means “now you gotta succeed.” His fourth lesson turns every major win into another task list. For McCarthy, the retail win changes the job from proving demand to delivering at scale.

Where should a kitchen founder start?

For a founder working from a kitchen, McCarthy recommends defining the intended customer and the product’s difference before pursuing scale, even while the ultimate ambition remains large.

He told that founder to identify who the product serves and why it differs. He urged founders to pursue a massive, well-loved brand while accepting unglamorous work and near-failures.

“You’re gonna take step one, but there’s gonna be step two million someday down the road,” McCarthy said. His fifth lesson asks founders to write down exactly who the product is for, then take the next step toward reaching them.

Unreal sells through unrealsnacks.com and major retailers including Costco, Target and Whole Foods. The brand posts on Instagram at @unreal.snacks. Under McCarthy’s framework, Unreal’s next test is practical: keep improving taste as its 35,000-store footprint expands and each new retailer raises execution demands.