The Discontinued Doritos Flavor That Still Exists Outside The US

Innovating new and trendy flavors is the bread and butter of snack food companies, at least those that are attempting to increase market share for their merchandise. Doritos is no different in this regard, having crated a variety of compelling products over the span of decades. To that end, in the 1970s, the tortilla chip company released a flavor now considered a staple for many snack brands: Sour Cream & Onion. However, this isn't a commodity you will find in the U.S. anytime soon as it has been discontinued.

While some snack foods are discontinued for good reason, it's not clear why Doritos stopped selling this flavor in the United States, especially when other brands have continued producing snacks with that very same flavor. Still, at least one lucky country in the world continues to have access to Sour Cream & Onion Doritos. One Redditor reviewed three types of Doritos they tried in Japan and, lo and behold, the elusive Sour Cream & Onion flavor was part of that trio.

Doritos has an extensive library of tastes it's made at one time or another, but its Sour Cream & Onion variety was one of the first to get axed. At some point during the 1980s, the PepsiCo subsidiary stopped making the flavor for the U.S. market. However, that hasn't stopped some folks from asking Doritos to bring it back.

Before Doritos' popular Cool Ranch line definitively won the hearts and minds of the American public, the tortilla chip conglomerate invested in television advertisements touting its then-new sour cream and onion-flavored chip. It clearly established a fanbase as the company brought that flavor back in 2013 as part of a retro throwback marketing campaign. Yet that makes it even more puzzling why the flavor was discontinued in the first place.

While sibling brand Lays has sold Sour Cream & Onion flavored snacks under its banner for quite some time with no signs it is on the way out, folks who want to taste that zesty essence on crunchy Doritos tortilla chips have signed a petition online through Change.org in hopes it will make a permanent return to stores. Although the petition has yet to garner even 1,000 signatures, this isn't necessarily an effort made in vain. Just ask fans of certain discontinued Aldi products how they got those items to return.