Justin Gold/Justin's nut butters.

• Author: Ryckman, Lisa
• Position: TRENDSETTERS - Brief article

Justin Gold's business began as a way to rectify a major inequity between bread slices everywhere: a gazillion flavors of the "J" in PB&J, and just two humble versions of the proverbial PB: crunchy or smooth.

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What about adding cinnamon or chocolate or honey? Gold wondered. How about changing up the peanut into almonds or hazelnuts? And how about making nut butter as pocket friendly as a wallet, by putting it, say, in a 1.5-ounce squeeze pack?

"I didn't invent peanut butter, and I didn't invent the squeeze pack," Gold says. "But I was the first guy to put them together in a marketable way."

What began as a yummy idea in 2004 is even yummier now, with millions in sales and eight varieties of nut butters sold on the shelves in Whole Foods, REI and a bunch of major (and minor) grocery stores and chains coast-to-coast. Retailers love the whole squeeze pack thing because they can put them next to full-sized jars so that consumers can try before they buy, Gold says.

"For consumers, for the first time ever, they can travel with a high-protein energy snack," he says. "It's become...