Shrinky-dink Twix
The thing about it is, I love a Twix and if I’m honest I’m a massive fan of Mars, despite their chocolate not being the best and their obsession in putting peanuts in everything – but a conversation with my sister brought something to my attention.
“Have you seen the Twix has got smaller?” she asked “I had one yesterday and it was tiny”
Well, that got my dander up, so I went in search of this twin fingered bounty – only to find she was right! I discovered the old size and the new shrink-dink version racked together in M&S – as the same price.
Slightly confused I contacted Mars’ press office, which is run by Freud PR and got this response
A Mars Chocolate UK spokesperson said: “As part of our commitment to promote responsible consumption, and as a signatory of the Department of Health’s Responsibility Deal calorie reduction programme, we made a pledge to ensure that all of our single-serve chocolate products would contain no more than 250 calories per portion by the end of 2013. To meet this commitment, after taking product reformulation as far as we can for now without compromising the great taste of the product, we have reduced the portion size of our TWIX bar to bring down the calorie content.”
For a second my inquisition was sated, but wait a minute… how come the Mars bar is 260Kcals and a Snickers weighs in at 300Kcals? Was the plan to reduce these to under 250Kcals as well? (And surely Twix isn’t a single serve chocolate? It’s got two fingers!)
I contacted Freud again, explaining my confusion about their initial response and got this response.
Hi Ben,
Thanks for coming back to us.
Please see below response from Mars Chocolate.
Best wishes,
Oli
A Mars Chocolate UK spokesperson said: “We are currently working to deliver our commitment of making all of our single-serve chocolate products no more than 250 calories per portion by the end 2013.”
Well that cleared that up then!!
And as my friend Tom said “If they really wanted to reduce the calories why not just put an apple in the wrapper?”
Virtually all Mars branded chocolate bars have shrunk. I work in a Spar shop and do the stock ordering & most Mars branded bars have shrunk more than once like twix, which was 62g then 58g and now only 50g. They may aswell make it a fun size bar and be done with it.
The litmus test for the Mars response is “Has the price been reduced commensurate with size to meet the govt. recommendations?” In the case of Mars the answer is a definitive “No.” Therefore, Mars has used the Govt. recommendations to increase/maintain profit margins.
What about customer satisfaction? Well… confectionery companies have now synthesized into gigantic multi-national conglomerates with a standard reference to customers “F*** ’em!”
When profit becomes the main focus quality and honesty goes down the pan. Personally I’d avoid buying anything from Mars, Nestle (a company where the word ‘quality’ doesn’t exist) and any of the giants any longer.
Only a fool would pay more for less. Sounds to me as though the same thing that happened with pensions is happening even to chocolate. Pay more get less!
Stop buying their crap and change the market place. Stop being a fool !!
For the first time in ages, I today bought a Twix from the vending machine in our office to go with my afternoon coffee. I noticed straight away that something had changed. Good to find confirmation here that it was not just my imagination. I’m old enough to remember the rampant inflation of the 1970s when such shrinkage and price increases were the order of the day, a particular victim being that playground favourite, the Curly Wurly!
As per Ciaran Dearle’s comment, I too bought a Twix from the office vending machine today for the first time in a long time as was shocked at how much smaller it seemed. I confirmed with my colleagues that it wasn’t just me, whereupon we uttered the immortal cry “To Google!” and then I found this post. Of course, this is nothing new but it really is the most insidious profiteering. Companies like Mars must love it when they can dress up a massive reduction in their costs without reducing the RRP as being a Government-encouraged thing for our comfort and safety.
Unbelievably they have shrunk yet further. I just bought a packet of Twixes: they’re 40g each!
I too have just been duped by Mars Chocolate UK,into paying more for less.
I was disgusted to find that the Twix bar I just paid 70p for, was tiny (by comparison to previously purchased “normal” sized Twix bars.)
So their best response is that they had to reduce it to 250 calories per portion,as a pledge to promote responsible consumption..etc.
Oh how considerate of them to care about my welfare! Shame they aren’t so concerned about the impact on my wallet,otherwise they would have reuced the
price of a Twix bar accordingly!
Profiteering bunch of c$nts!
Regards,
Angry of Folkestone.
Most chocolate bars have been reduced in size but not reduced in price.
Twix is so small now its a joke.
will not be buying any twix bars ever again and I’m sure a lot of people feel the same.
the more people that don’t buy the better and maybe they will realise that they can’t keep ripping us off
Now there’s 4 for a £ package… & it looks like regular sized bars, but when you open the pack there’s a cardboard ‘tray’ and then you see the smaller bars. 40g each. Annoying.