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Snickers

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''This entry is about the confectionery named Snickers. For other uses, see Snickers (disambiguation).
Snickers (original)
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Snickers (original)

Snickers (original)
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Snickers (original)

Snickers (original)
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Snickers (original)

Marathon bar
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Marathon bar

Snickers is a candy bar made by Mars, Incorporated. It is made from nougat topped with peanuts and caramel covered with milk chocolate. Snickers is the best selling candy bar of all time and has annual global sales of $2 billion.

The original Snickers bar was sold as Marathon in the UK and Ireland until 1990. More recently, the name Snickers Marathon has been associated with energy bar variants of the standard Snickers sold in some markets.

Contents

History

In 1930, the Mars family introduced its second brand, Snickers, named after one of their favorite horses. They were first sold for a nickel. It is made by forming a nougat center into large slabs, which are cut to size once the caramel and peanuts have been added. After the centers are formed, they are coated with thick milk chocolate. The completed bars are inspected, wrapped, and packed in cases for shipment. From 1949 to 1952, Snickers was a sponsor of "The Howdy Doody Show". The "Fun Size" bar was introduced in 1968 and has been a popular Halloween treat ever since. Following decades saw ever more Snickers varieties introduced.

Snickers bars were particularly popular among movie-goers during the 1970s and early 1980s, outselling some of its important competitors at movie theaters. The Snickers brand is also available at many supermarkets, pharmacies and stores worldwide.

In 1995, Snickers launched a website to support its sponsorship of Euro '96, a pan-European soccer tournament. The website was groundbreaking in soliciting match previews and reviews from its visitors, who generated some 4,000 match reports, and the website won various international design, advertising and online community awards.

In 2006, the UK Food Commission highlighted celebrity chef Antony Worrall Thompson's "Snickers pie", which contained five Snickers bars among other ingredients, suggesting it was one of the unhealthiest desserts ever; one slice providing "over 1,250 calories from sugar and fat alone", more than half a day's requirement for an average adult. The Pie had featured on his BBC Saturday program some two years earlier and the chef described it as an occasional treat only. [link]

Renaming of original \"Marathon\" in UK and Ireland

In the United Kingdom and Ireland, Snickers bars were originally sold under the name "Marathon". In 1990, Mars standardized many of its global brand names, and the name was changed to Snickers.

M&M Mars used an aggressive advertisement campaign with memorable portrayals of irate foreign visitors attempting to order "Snickers" from confused shopkeepers. For eighteen months thereafter, both names were retained on the wrapper[The Marathon candy bar], Christian Science Monitor, Home forum 1999-03-18 – first with 'Marathon' in larger letters, then with 'Snickers' in larger letters. This caused a certain amount of derision, as the unfamiliar 'Snickers' was, to British ears, meaningless, and sounded very much like 'knickers'.

The change of name attained some prominence in British popular culture. As of 2006, it still occasionally appears as the subject or punchline of comedy routines.

The 2004 launch of the distinct Snickers Marathon energy bar caused some confusion.[Snickers Marathon?? Screwing with my brain and the past], techno.blog("Dion") 2004-02-23.

Snickers variations

Others include:

Snickers Marathon energy bars

The "Snickers Marathon" energy bars are sold as an alternative to Powerbars, Clif and similar rivals. The range includes:-

They are available on both the U.S. and U.K. markets.

Snickers Marathon is not to be confused with "Marathon", the former name for Snickers in the UK and Ireland.

Health Concerns

Over the years there have been a few health scares with Snickers bars.

In late June of 2006, the Mars, Incorporated factory in Chicago, IL which produces Snickers bars (in addition to M&M's, Milky Ways and many others) was temporarily closed down by health inspectors. Inspectors stated they found as many as 20 rat droppings in a food storage area and about 7 gnats in another. Additional violations included buildups of grease, chocolate, and food debris. Reportedly, the health department made a visit to the factory prior to this inspection and gave notice that all of the violations had to be corrected by the time they returned a week later. When they returned, none of the repairs had been made. Mars stands to be fined up to $1,500 for the violation.[link]

In July of 2005, tens of thousands of Snickers and Mars Bars were pulled off the shelves in Australia due to a series of threatening letters which resulted in fears the candy bars had been poisoned. Mars received 3 letters from an unidentified individual indicating that he planned to distribute poisoned candy bars to store shelves. The last letter he sent included a Snickers bar contaminated with a substance which was not identified. The letters claimed that there were 7 additional candy bars which had been tampered with which were for sale to the public. As a precautionary measure, Mars issued the massive recall. Mars said that there was never any demand for money, only complaints directed to an unidentified third party. Police never discovered any evidence of tampering in any of the bars that were recalled.

References

External links

 

From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.

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