There’s a term that’s used in many businesses, specifically in the manufacturing, shipping, trucking, and retailing sectors: “Breakage.” It’s pretty obvious what that means, of course, as is the definition of a common term heard around the food and restaurant industries: “Spoilage.”

Accounting for breakage and spoilage can cost American companies billions of dollars each year. It’s a serious problem with no easy solutions. Of course, they sell insurance for such eventualities at every stop along the way, from factory or farm to retail shelves, but that cost is simply passed on to the consumers.

A product that was immune to breakage and immune to spoilage? Well, that would be the Holy Grail of foodstuffs, no?

And what if that miracle product didn’t weigh that much and was easy to ship?

A product like that can’t just be conjured out of thin air, though, can it?

We imagine the birth of FAILCHIPS went something like this…

SCENE: A CORPORATE BOARDROOM ON MADISON AVENUE.

“What are we gonna do with all of these millions of bags of smashed-up potato chips?”

“Can we give them to charity?”

“For a tax write-off? That’s one idea. Anyone else?”

“Why don’t we simply re-brand the leftover potato chip crumbs? Call them something ironic—like “FAILCHIPS”—and sell ‘em to hipsters?”

STUNNED, UNCOMFORTABLE SILENCE IN THE ROOM. EVERYONE PRESENT LOOKS DOWN AND SHUFFLES PAPERS NERVOUSLY. YOU CAN HEAR A PIN DROP, THEN THE BOSS SPEAKS.

“You’re an evil genius, Randall… Any ideas for how we can rebrand all of that rancid beef I’m sitting on in Wichita?”