Miami entrepreneur Rodolfo Saccoman has closed a $750,000 pre-seed funding round for Coditos, a snack brand built on a Cuban recipe for crunchy macaroni that is now sold in more than 215 retail locations across South Florida. The round included New York-based CPG venture fund Blue Collective, the University of Miami Canes Angel Network, and Azoic Ventures, among others.
The product traces back to Saccoman’s mother-in-law, Yezmin Leon, who learned the recipe in Cuba decades ago: boil pasta, sun-dry it for two to three days, flash-fry it in oil, and toss it with salt. When Saccoman tasted it in his mother-in-law’s Miami garden two years ago, he immediately recognized the commercial potential. “These things are absolutely crunchy, flavorful, and non-sticky,” he told Refresh Miami. “Then I’m thinking this is America’s comfort food — macaroni.” The name Coditos, meaning “little elbows,” refers to the elbow macaroni shape that defines the product.
Coditos now sells an average of 45 bags per store per week across chains including Sedano’s Supermarkets, Presidente Supermarkets, and Navarro pharmacies — well above the five-to-eight-bag industry average for emerging brands, according to Saccoman, all achieved with zero marketing spend. The company operates from a Doral warehouse, maintaining direct distribution relationships with store managers rather than using third-party distributors. “We have systems where I can see velocity per store, per day, per demographic, per chain … and that changes the game,” Saccoman said. “It becomes a superpower.”
Saccoman, a veteran of the Miami startup ecosystem for two decades with previous ventures in digital billboards (AdMobilize) and decentralized finance (CryptoLeague), runs Coditos with a tech-founder’s discipline. He engineered the brand identity, standardized recipes, and designed the brand’s mascot — “Codito,” a joyful character representing the best of Miami — using AI tools including ChatGPT, Claude, and Flux. He deliberately launched only two SKUs — the Traditional Cuban recipe and a “Better-For-You” variant made with avocado oil — to avoid the classic CPG mistake of overextending flavors early on. By analyzing historical CPG playbooks through AI models, Saccoman avoided common rookie mistakes that derail many first-time food entrepreneurs.
The company’s target for 2026 is to scale from 215 stores to 700 across South Florida and potentially one or two additional Florida markets. Saccoman is also exploring channels including corporate offices, schools, universities, and cruise lines. He describes himself as a “compound founder” — simultaneously running a CPG brand while developing additional tech ventures, enabled by AI tools like Lovable that compress product development timelines from months to hours. Before expanding nationally, he wants to saturate the South Florida market, raising the question: could Coditos become the official snack of the University of Miami or Florida International University?
