Grocery’s pistachio craze shows no sign of abating, despite prices hovering near last summer’s historic highs.
Supermarkets and suppliers are still looking to capitalise on the popularity of the nut – with a glut of NPD rolling out in recent weeks.
M&S last month added a swathe of pistachio-flavoured chocolate lines for Easter, including The Big Daddy Pistachio Loaded Half Egg, Eggstra Gooey Pistachio Eggs and Pistachio Crème Filled Eggs.
The retailer has also brought back Pistachio Rolled Eggs for 2026, while Co-op last month added Pistachio Chocolate Eggs, filled with pistachio ganache.
Elsewhere, Lindt expanded its Excellence range with Pistachio at the start of 2026. For Easter, it added Dubai-Style Eggs filled with pistachio cream and kadayif pastry, and Pistachio Mini Eggs at the end of January.
Magnum added La Pistache as part of its Signature ice cream range, inspired by trending patisserie flavours, which launched last month. The NPD boasts a “pistachio enriched” shell with caramelised, salted pistachio pieces, dipped in Magnum chocolate, and features pistachio ice cream with a “smooth” pistachio gelato core, enriched with pistachio paste.
Meanwhile, Nuii brought its Cream & Anatolian Pistachio ice cream sticks to the UK in January. Coated in white chocolate and pieces of roasted crushed pistachios, the ice cream launched to some European markets last year and “quickly established itself as a bestseller”, said Nuii brand manager Henry Craven.
Also in January, Vieve added Pistachio Punch protein bar.
Pricier pistachios
Pistachio commodity prices jumped by almost a third last year due to soaring demand coupled with tight supply.
The average price of in-shell pistachios from the US – supplier of about 60% of Europe’s imports – rose 31% to $4.65/lb between January 2024 and June 2025 [Expana]. Prices remain elevated, having dipped only slightly to $4.50/lb in January 2026.
Pistachio kernels exceeded $10/lb last summer, and neared $11/lb last month.
While the 2025/26 US crop was “the largest harvest in history… it fell short of earlier expectations”, said Nick Moss, Expana nut market reporter. However, smaller harvests in Iran and Turkey helped support availability.
Industry sources had “expressed some concern regarding evolving global trade flows”, but these were “offset by continued strong global demand”, Moss added.
As a result, Moss predicted pricing for the commodity would “continue to follow a stable-to-firm trend”, which should point to a continuation of the elevated pricing seen over the past year.
Supplier pressures
Nuii’s Craven said the brand had been “working closely” with its suppliers of Anatolian pistachios “to ensure larger crops were planned, to help meet the rising demand”.
January’s launch of its Cream & Anatolian Pistachio ice cream sticks followed “a lot of consumer demand for us to add this flavour to our UK portfolio, so we’ve been prepared for this launch for quite some time”, he said.
Smaller suppliers have been faced with the dilemma of absorbing elevated pistachio costs or discontinuing lines containing the ingredient.
Vieve founder Rafael Rozenson said the production cost of Pistachio Punch was “10% higher” than other variants. “We can’t charge a different price for it, so we have to swallow the cost,” he said.
Meanwhile, plant-based ice cream brand Gelato Bros has been making “a pistachio baklawa flavour for years now (since before the Dubai chocolate craze) and it’s always been our bestseller”, said founder Osama Rashed.
“Since the craze and the shortage in pistachios, every time we come to order pistachios, prices from our suppliers have gone up.
“It’s particularly impactful on us as a super clean label brand as we don’t even use natural flavourings so we have a really high pistachio content (14%) compared to others in the industry (as low as 1%).
“It puts us in a tricky situation where we have to really think about whether it makes financial sense to continue producing our pistachio baklawa flavour or to potentially discontinue our bestselling product as it becomes cost prohibitive.”
Pistachio flavouring
The Coconut Collab appears to have found a solution for suppliers hoping to hop on the pistachio trend without navigating changing commodity costs. Its Pistachio Pots, which launched in September, contain green colouring and pistachio flavouring, rather than real pistachios.
However, their formulation had “nothing to do with supply or cost”, insisted Joe Farrar, marketing manager at The Coconut Collab. Instead, “we avoid the serious allergen of nuts in our desserts range to keep them as inclusive as possible”, he explained.
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