Snickers

Snickers

Product type	Confectionery
Owner	Mars, Incorporated
Introduced	1930
Markets	World
Website	www.snickers.com

Snickers is a brand name chocolate bar made by Mars, Incorporated. It consists of nougat topped with caramel and peanuts, enrobed in milk chocolate.^[1] Snickers has annual global sales of $2 billion.^[2]

In the United Kingdom, the Isle of Man, and Ireland, Snickers was sold under the brand name Marathon until 1990.^[3] More recently, Snickers Marathon branded energy bars have been sold in some markets.^[4]

History

In 1930^[5] Mars introduced Snickers, named after the favorite horse of the Mars family.^[6] The Snickers candy bar consists of nougat, peanuts, and caramel with a chocolate coating. The bar was marketed under the name "Marathon" in the UK and Ireland until July 19, 1990, when Mars decided to align the UK product with the global Snickers name (Mars had marketed and discontinued an unrelated bar named Marathon in the United States during the 1970s). There are also several other Snickers products such as Snickers mini, dark chocolate, ice cream bars, Snickers with almonds, and Snickers peanut butter bars.^[7]

Snickers Duo

A replacement for the king size Snickers bar was launched in the UK in 2004 and designed to conform to the September 2004 Food and Drink Federation (FDF) "Manifesto for Food and Health". Part of the FDF manifesto was seven pledges of action to encourage the food and drink industry to be more health conscious.^[8] Reducing portion size, clearer food labels, and reduction of the levels of fat, sugar, and salt were among the FDF pledges. Mars Incorporated pledged to phase out their king-size bars in 2005 and replace them with shareable bars. A Mars spokesman said: "Our king-size bars that come in one portion will be changed so they are shareable or can be consumed on more than one occasion. The name king-size will be phased out."^[8]

These were eventually replaced by the 'Duo', a double bar pack. Though this change to Duos reduced the weight from 3.5 to 3.29 ounces (99 to 93 g), the price remained the same. The packaging has step-by-step picture instructions of how to open a Duo into two bars, in four simple actions.^[9] As Mars stated fulfillment of their promise, the Duo format was met with criticism by the National Obesity Forum and National Consumer Council.^[10]

Australian recall

On December 25, 2000, tens of thousands of Snickers and Mars Bars were removed from New South Wales store shelves due to a series of threatening letters which resulted in fears that the chocolate bars had been poisoned.^[11] Mars received letters from an unidentified individual indicating that they planned to plant poisoned chocolate bars on store shelves.^[11] The last letter sent included a Snickers bar contaminated with a substance which was later identified as rat poison.^[11] The letters claimed that there were seven additional chocolate bars which had been tampered with and which were for sale to the public.^[11] As a precautionary measure, Mars issued a massive recall.^[11] Mars said that there had been no demand for money and complaints directed to an unidentified third party.^[11]

Caloric value

The USDA lists the caloric value of a 2 ounce (57 gram) Snickers bar as 280 calories (1,200 J).^[12] The UK lists it as 296kcal for the 58 gram bar

Products containing Snickers

Containing approximately 450 calories (1,900 J) per bar,^[13] deep fried chocolate bars (including Snickers and Mars bars) became a specialty in fish and chips shops in the Scotland in 1995,^[14] and in the early 2000s, became popular at US state fairs.

In 2012, the British Food Commission highlighted celebrity chef Antony Worrall Thompson's "Snickers pie",^[15] which contained five Snickers bars among other ingredients, suggesting it was one of the unhealthiest desserts ever; one slice providing "over 1,250 calories (5,200 J) from sugar and fat alone", more than half a day's requirement for an average adult. The pie had featured on his BBC Saturday programme some two years earlier and the chef described it as an occasional treat only.^[16]

The Cheesecake Factory restaurant bakes and sells its own "Snicker's Bar Chunks and Cheesecake" which consists of its own Original Cheesecake with whole Snickers chunks baked into it. It is topped with peanuts and drizzled with chocolate sauce for the plate presentation.^[17]

Variations

• 1970 - 1973: Snickers Munch
• 1990–Present: Snickers Ice Cream bar
• 1996 - 2011: Snickers Ice Cream cone
• 2001–Present: Snickers Cruncher bar (rebranded Snickers Munch in some markets, still sold as "Cruncher" in Italy, Germany, Romania, Egypt, Poland, Latvia, Austria, Slovakia, Israel, Sweden, The Netherlands, Bosnia, and Portugal)

• 2002 - 2009: Snickers almond bar
• 2002 - 2008: Cookies & Snickers
• 2004–Present: Snickers Marathon energy bars
• 2006 - 2009: Snickers Duo
• 2006 - 2009: Snickers Xtreme (5 grams (0.18 oz) of protein per serving, lack of nougat)
• 2007 - 2010: Snickers Dark (dark chocolate)
• 2008: Snickers Charged (limited edition, contains caffeine, taurine, and B vitamins). It is the only Snickers bar to contain energy stimulants.

^[18]

• 2008–present: Snickers The Lot (Crispy pieces in a thick cream, caramel, sprinkled with a large amount of nuts, and covered in chocolate (Australia and New Zealand))
• 2009: Snickers Fudge (Limited edition)
• 2010: Snickers Maximus, a limited edition with only caramel & peanut in the center.
• 2010: More Nuts, a limited edition featuring 10% higher nut content
• 2010: Snickers Almond
• 2011: Snickers Peanut Butter. Discontinued and replaced by Snickers PB Squared
• 2011: Snickers Peanut Butter Squared. Added to replace Snickers Peanut Butter.
• 2011: Snickers 3x Chocolate
• 2012: Snickers 3x Nuts. Introduced in Australia.
• 2013: More Nuts. same as 2010.^[19]
• 2013: More Caramel. Re-release of Snickers Maximus.^[19]

Others include:

• Snickers Fun Size (small, bite-size bars popular for Halloween)
• Snickers Minis
• Snickers Flapjack
• Peanut Butter Squared^[20]
• Snickers Gold
• Snickers Cake
• Snickers Ice Cream (Snickers Ice Cream Bars, Snickers Minis Ice Cream Bars, Snickers Ice Cream Cones, and Snickers Ice Cream Brownies)
• Snickers Nut N Butter Crunch
• Snickers Crazy Peanuts (limited edition, sold in Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia)
• Snickers Hard (limited edition, sold in Armenia, Czech Republic, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, and Slovakia)
• Snickers 220 V (limited edition, contains guarana and L-carnitine, sold in 2007 in Slovakia and Poland)
• Frozen Snickers (otherwise known as a Frozen Mungler)
• Snickers Hazelnut (Ukraine, Australia, and Poland; standard bar is 70 grams (2.5 oz), Duo bar +15% is two 40.5 grams (1.43 oz) bars resulting in a 81 grams (2.9 oz) combined bar)
• Snickers Miniatures (in Celebrations)
• Snickers Maple (limited edition, sold in Canada only)
• Snickers with Green Shrek Filling (limited edition, sold as a tie-in with the movie Shrek the Third)
• Snickers Adventure Bar (limited edition, sold as Indiana Jones promotion with chocolate, nuts, spice, and coconut flavor)
• Snickers Rockin' Nut Road (limited edition, sold as Rocky Nut Road in Canada, contains almonds, caramel, marshmallow flavored nougat, and dark chocolate)
• Snickers Chocolate Spread
• Snickers Super (Ukraine; before 2009 it was 95 grams (3.4 oz), in 2009 it became 100 grams (3.5 oz), in 2010 it was split into two 50.5 grams (1.78 oz) bars resulting in a 101 grams (3.6 oz) combined bar)

Advertising

Not Going Anywhere For a While?

Beginning in 1995, Snickers ran ads which featured someone making a self-inflicted mistake, with the voice-over saying "Not going anywhere for a while? Grab a Snickers!".

One such ad had a player for a fictional American football team showing off his new tattoo of the team's logo on his back to his teammates. He then shows it to his head coach who, after complimenting the tattoo, immediately tells him that he's been traded to Miami. The player then goes to have his old team's logo replaced with the new team's logo.^[21]

Some of the ads were done in conjunction with the National Football League, with whom Snickers had a sponsorship deal at the time. One memorable ad featured a member of the grounds crew at Arrowhead Stadium painting the field for an upcoming Kansas City Chiefs game in hot, late-summer weather. After finishing one of the end zones, and visibly exhausted, one of the Chiefs players walks up to him and says the field looks great, "but who are the Chefs?", showing that despite all the hard work the painter accidentally omitted the "i" in Chiefs.^[22]

Snickers Feast

In 2007, Snickers launched a campaign which featured Henry the VIII and a Viking among others who attend the "Snickers Feast". It consisted of various commercials of the gang and their adventures on the feast.^[23]

Super Bowl XLI commercial

On February 4, 2007, during Super Bowl XLI, Snickers commercials aired which resulted in complaints by gay and lesbian groups against the maker of the candy bar, Masterfoods USA of Hackettstown, New Jersey, a division of Mars, Incorporated. The commercial showed a pair of auto mechanics accidentally touching lips while sharing a Snickers bar. Realizing that they "accidentally kissed", they, in three of the four versions, "do something manly" (mostly in the form of injury, including tearing out chest hair, striking each other with a very large pipe wrench, and drinking motor oil and windshield washer fluid). In the fourth version, a third mechanic shows up and asks if there is "room for three in this Love Boat".

Complaints were lodged against Masterfoods that the ads were homophobic. Human Rights Campaign president Joe Solmonese is quoted as saying

"This type of jeering from professional sports figures at the sight of two men kissing fuels the kind of anti-gay bullying that haunts countless gay and lesbian school children on playgrounds all across the country."^[24]

Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) president Neil Giuliano said "That Snickers, Mars and the NFL would promote and endorse this kind of prejudice is simply inexcusable." Masterfoods has since pulled the ads and the website.^[24][25][26]

Mr. T

In 2006, Mr. T starred in a Snickers advert in the UK where he rides up in an army tank and shouts abuse at a football player who appears to be faking an injury, threatening to introduce him to his friend Pain. Another advert featured Mr. T launching bars at a swimmer who appeared to refuse to get in a swimming pool because of the cold temperature of the water. In 2008, a European Snickers commercial in which Mr. T uses a Jeep-mounted Minigun to fire Snickers bars at a speedwalker for being a "disgrace to the man race" was pulled after complaints from a US pressure group that the advertisement was homophobic.^[27] The ad originally began airing mid-2007. Mr. T's main line in the ad was "Snickers: Get Some Nuts!"

NASCAR

In NASCAR racing, Snickers (and the rest of the Mars affiliated brands) sponsor Kyle Busch's #18 Toyota for Joe Gibbs Racing. Prior to that the brand served as a primary sponsor for Ricky Rudd's #88 Robert Yates Racing Ford as well as an associate sponsor for the team's #38 car driven first by Elliott Sadler and then by David Gilliland, and an associate sponsor for the MB2 Motorsports #36 Pontiac driven by Derrike Cope, Ernie Irvan, Ken Schrader, and others. In 1990 Bobby Hillin drove for Stavola Brothers Racing in the Snickers Buick, marking the candy's first appearance as a sponsor.

Celebrity ads

In 2010, Betty White and Abe Vigoda appeared in a Snickers commercial, playing American football. The commercial was ranked by ADBOWL as the best advertisement of the year. Later that year, Snickers commercials featured singers Aretha Franklin and Liza Minnelli, and comedians Richard Lewis and Roseanne Barr. A 2011 commercial featured actors Joe Pesci and Don Rickles.

You're Not You When You're Hungry

In 2010, a new advertising campaign was launched, based around men turning into different things (for instance Betty White or a nagging Joe Pesci in the United States) when they're hungry (taking the new campaign's name "You're Not You When You're Hungry" quite literally), depending on the commercial's location or what variety the commercial is showing. In the US, the slogan was changed to "Snickers Satisfies", but the UK version (featuring men in a changing room turning into Joan Collins and Stephanie Beacham as a result of hunger) retains Mr. T's slogan. In Latin America the slogan was the same as in the UK version, except that men doing extreme sports turning into the Mexican singer Anahí as a result of hunger.^[28] In 2013, Robin Williams and Bobcat Goldthwait also appeared in a Snickers football commercial.

See also

• Snickers salad
• Snickers pie
• List of chocolate bar brands

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Snickers.

• Official website
• The UK campaign to rename the bar back to Marathon
• Snickers Latin America

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