RUNTS RANT!: How Nestle keeps dropping the Wonka ball

Tuesday, April 1, 2008 - by Lance

Candy is serious business. Well maybe not exactly, but it’s generally thought to be a bad idea to muck with things that people are personally invested in. No matter what it is, someone out there loves it and they’re going to be angry when it changes.

Case in point: Willy Wonka substituted cherry and lime with pineapple and mango in its popular Runts candy this past year with less than stellar response. Mango is a highly unusual flavor to see as far as candy goes, although I found the Runts version to be adequately pleasing. Pineapple, while usually popular enough, is executed horribly for Runts. Both the shape and the flavor are crude representations of actual fruit and it is not very pleasing to the eye or the tongue.

So why would Wonka replace two original (and in the case of cherry, very popular) flavors for two that lack the quality or recognition to fill their void? Who’s to say? Though the “¡Sabores Nuevos! Piña Y Mango” emblazoned on the package would appear to speak volumes about the decision to include these new flavors.

This isn’t the first time that changes have been made to the Runts lineup. In the late 90’s lime was replaced with two flavors, watermelon and blue raspberry (both originally from the short-lived Tropical Runts). So in effect four flavors were lost to make room for pineapple and mango. Another variation called Rock N’ Runts came a little later comprised of the offending pineapple, lemon, watermelon, raspberry, and grape.

While many find the substitution of lime and cherry to be a travesty, my aggravation goes a level deeper. To me Runts are the last bastion of the fruit flavor flag previously carried by Wonka’s legendary Wacky Wafers. There are many fruit flavored candies on the market, but none were as fine as the versions found in Wacky Wafers. Something that Runts shared with the now discontinued Wacky Wafers were the carryover of both the banana and the orange flavors (unfortunately, strawberry didn’t make the same transition).

Now if I were going to make a change to Runts, I would look to the past. I would reintroduce Runts with the Wacky Wafer lineup using those flavor versions of green apple, strawberry, watermelon, orange and banana. A change like this (although still omitting the much loved cherry) would be met with more open arms by the public at large than the inclusion of a poorly translated pineapple and the less than popular mango.

I can’t fault Nestle/Wonka for trying to cater to the Hispanic demographic as it continues to rise in prominence across the country, but there has to be a better way than experimenting (poorly) with such a popular product. Instead, embrace the past with a line of Wacky Runts with the flavors used in Wacky Wafers, and reintroduce Tropical Runts with Pineapple, Mango, Lemon, Lime, and Cherry. Sounds like a win-win situation to me.

• Play the Runts Collector Game
• Wonka Homepage

Buy Runts Online:

• at Candy Direct
• at Amazon.com

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