Twisties
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Twisties is a snack food product available in Australia, Malta, New Zealand, Singapore, Malaysia, Fiji and now the UK. The brand name is owned by The Smith's Snackfood Company. While originally an Australian owned company, Smith's was acquired in August 1998, by Frito-Lay the second largest producer of snack foods in Australia, which in turn is owned by PepsiCo. Twisties are very similar to Nik Naks in the UK, which were developed by Smiths Crisps there in the early 1980s.
Twisties are now selling very well in the UK, where they are known as Tastees. Tastees use the slogan "Taste Tastees" in their adverts. Tastees are expected to be as popular in the UK as they are in other countries - [3].Tastees in the UK are owned by Tastees UK.
Twisties are one of the most popular snack foods in Australia. Smith's claims it to be the "number one extruded snack brand"[4].
They are made primarily of corn and rice, fried in vegetable oil and then coloured and flavoured. The corn and rice batter is extruded into the hot oil, resulting in a relatively dense product compared to most similar snack foods, such as Cheetos and Burger Rings, and a distinctive mouth texture.
Twisties were originally available only in cheese flavour, but chicken flavour was introduced and became a standard part of the product line. There have also been flavours in various countries as diverse as Toffee, Tomato and Salmon Teriyaki.
Twisties have been advertised for several years with the well-known slogan "Life's pretty straight without... Twisties". Typical television advertisements play on the slogan by showing people in mundane situations being transported to surreal and exciting environments when they eat Twisties.
They are also sold on the Italian market with the name Fonzies. Fonzies are pale yellow in colour, because they do not use the bright orange food colouring that normal Twisties uses. Fonzies are baked, not fried. Although sold in Italy, Fonzies are produced in Germany by LU Snack Foods GmbH.
[edit] Trivia
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- Australian celebrities Nikki Webster and Natalie Imbruglia launched their careers with childhood appearances in Twisties commercials.
- The 1996 Saatchi & Saatchi Twisties advertising campaign, "Life's pretty straight without Melrose", won awards from the Advertising Federation of Australia. The campaign centred around linking Twisties to Melrose Place, then one of the most popular programs on Australian television.[1]
- In January 2006, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration refused import rights for Twisties because of mislabelling.[2] The FDA again denied import rights in May 2006, this time citing unsafe colouring.[3]
- A similar snack exists in France, called Croustilles. They are available in such diverse flavours as Peanut, Salsa and traditional cheese. Also in Italy, a similar snack is known as "Fonzies".
- In Australia, Bacon flavor Twisties were produced briefly in the early 1970's, but were not a success and were withdrawn from the market after only a year. On the other hand, In Malta the bacon flavoured Twistees are known as Tastees and while much less popular than the original Twistees are still produced to this day.
- In an episode of The Chaser's War on Everything one of their segments was a spoof of the popular self help film The Secret. In the spoof they showed a clip of The Secret showing a Twisties packet being over a cats head and the family laughing. The man being interviewed claimed the little things in life is what mattered and works to help bring the family together. Chas Licciardello thought he would give it a try and placed it over his cats head with a rubber band, consequently suffocating the cat.
- There is a famous reference to Twisties in the lyrics of the Skyhooks song, "Smut", that featured on the album Living in the Seventies.
