As of 2008, Shreddies had been one of Canada’s most popular breakfast cereals for nearly seventy years. First introduced in 1939, the lattice-woven whole-wheat squares, similar to Chex in the US were a household fixture. They were reliable and nutritious. They were also undeniably square. Then, Kraft and advertising agency Ogilvy & Mather announced a … Read more
In the modern marketing and corporate naming industry, a self-serving myth has taken over, the idea that multi-billion-dollar food brands engineer their success through predictive psycho-linguistics and sound symbolism. According to popular theories of phonetic branding, corporate consultants can manipulate front versus back vowels and soft fricatives versus harsh plosives to subconsciously dictate a consumer’s … Read more
For anyone who grew up in the 1950s to mid-1970s, few childhood memories carry as much magic as the neighborhood “penny candy store.” It was rarely a gleaming, brightly lit confectionery. More often than not, it was a dark, cramped little shack. A neighborhood corner grocer, or a family-run dry-goods shop. But for a child … Read more
Ask almost anyone in advertising or business school why early cake mixes failed, and you will hear the exact same famous story. The legend goes like this: In the early 1950s, Betty Crocker launched a revolutionary “just add water” instant cake mix. It was a triumph of food processing technology, everything needed for a rich, … Read more
Today, candy brands compete almost entirely on taste, texture, and flavor intensity. From extreme sour coatings to single-origin dark chocolate, modern candy is engineered to deliver an immediate sensory reward. In the mid-to-late 20th century, however, a huge segment of the candy industry operated on a completely different business model: the interactive novelty candy. For … Read more
A common piece of wartime trivia claims that M&M’s were originally invented for the military as a combat ration. The truth is more nuanced. While M&M’s became an indispensable staple for American soldiers during World War II, they were not created for the armed forces. Instead, they were conceived to solve the commercial confectionery industry’s … Read more