The stuffed snack that tastes like junk food and is secretly, stubbornly good for you. Yellow pea protein in the disguise of Late Night Pizza.
There is a familiar problem in the snack business, which is that the food people want to eat and the food that is good for them are, roughly speaking, opposites. The industry has spent decades trying to close that gap and mostly failing, because the honest way to make a chip taste like a chip is to make it a chip. Rivalz, a nine-person company based in Sonoma, California, has taken a different bet: that you can build a snack from yellow pea protein, oven-bake it, stuff it with two textures and a nostalgic flavor, and get something that a person will eat because they want to, not because they should.
The result is a small, dual-textured, stuffed bite that arrives with 8 grams of plant protein, 4 grams of fiber, seven essential vitamins and minerals, and no added sugar - and that is named, without irony, "Late Night Pizza." The other flavors are "Extra Chedda' Mac" and "Spicy Street Taco." This is not the naming convention of a wellness brand. It is the naming convention of the thing the wellness brand is trying to replace. That is the entire strategy, and it is a good one.
"Better Snacks. Period."
Peter Barrick, the co-founder and CEO, did not come up through consumer packaged goods in the usual way. He graduated from UC Davis, joined the Marine Corps, was selected for jet aviation, flew combat missions in Afghanistan, worked as a Joint Terminal Attack Controller, and then taught other pilots how to fly before leaving to get an MBA - also at UC Davis. This is a résumé that suggests a person who is comfortable being outmatched on paper and winning anyway, which is a useful disposition when your competitor is Mars and its decades-old Combos.
He did not build Rivalz alone. The founding group reads like a mismatched heist crew: a former Marine aviator, a former Mars Chief Science Officer (Harold Schmitz), a UC Davis AI researcher (Ilias Tagkopoulos), and several longtime food-industry hands. The pairing is the point - someone who understands the craving working next to people who understand the chemistry, with UC Davis food scientists helping engineer the dual-texture snack itself.
"I thrive when the environment is risky or chaotic. That's what I was built to do - bring clarity to a foggy situation."
Each is oven-baked, built on yellow pea protein and brown rice, and free of wheat, nuts, dairy, soy and animal products. Sold direct-to-consumer, on Amazon, in grocery and in vending machines.
The flagship. A pizza-inspired stuffed bite with 8g plant protein, 4g fiber and no added sugar - the flavor your 1 a.m. self wants, minus the regret.
Nostalgic mac-and-cheese flavor, vegan and gluten-free, dairy-free by design. Comfort food re-engineered around pea and rice.
A spicy taco riff with the same nutrition backbone - 8g protein, 7 vitamins and minerals, a little heat.
All three signature flavors in one box - the low-commitment way to find your favorite before you buy the case.
Launched alongside the 2026 raise, the Puffs extend the plant-protein platform into a lighter, airier texture and new channels.
The discipline isn't ten SKUs - it's one technology that can wear many textures. Depth first, breadth second.
Per one-ounce serving. The claim Rivalz makes is not that it is a health food, but that it is a snack that happens to carry real nutrition - and does it at a mainstream price point instead of a premium one.
Rivalz has raised roughly $11.1M to date. The 2024 seed round, backed by The March Group and private investors, put the stuffed snacks on shelves. In June 2026 the company netted a $5M raise and used the moment to launch its Puffs line and chase new foodservice and retail deals.
~$8.4M total seed; The March Group + private investors.
$5M raise alongside the Puffs launch.
CPG veterans, food scientists and a former Marine start the company.
Three stuffed-snack flavors debut, backed by The March Group.
Toward ~2,000 stores; Amazon sales grow 8.4x year over year.
New product line and a push into foodservice and retail.
Health-conscious snackers, parents, and anyone dodging gluten, dairy, soy or nuts - plus institutional buyers. Rivalz landed in nearly 2,000 stores and cut a deal to put its snacks in LA Unified School District vending machines, which is a quietly important detail: the mission is nutrition for everyone, and that only works if the price and the distribution are ordinary.
On one side, legacy stuffed snacks - most pointedly Mars' Combos, which Rivalz has openly named as its target. On the other, the crowded better-for-you shelf: Quest, Hippeas, Lesser Evil, Bada Bean Bada Boom and a growing field of high-protein, plant-based challengers. Rivalz's wager is that dual-texture technology plus craving-first flavors is a harder thing to copy than a health claim.
A Sonoma, California snack company making oven-baked, dual-textured stuffed snacks on yellow pea protein - 8g plant protein, 4g fiber, no added sugar and seven vitamins per serving.
Yes - vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free and non-GMO, with no wheat, nuts, soy or animal products.
Late Night Pizza, Extra Chedda' Mac and Spicy Street Taco, plus a Puffs line added in 2026.
Founded in 2022 by Peter Barrick (CEO), a former Marine aviator, with co-founders including ex-Mars scientist Harold Schmitz and UC Davis researcher Ilias Tagkopoulos.
Roughly $11.1M total - a 2024 seed round backed by The March Group and a $5M raise announced in June 2026.
Search these to see the snacks and hear the founder tell it firsthand.