Rivals M&M/Mars, Nestle Plot Under-the-Radar Skirmishes for '00

Brandweek, Sept 27, 1999 by Mike Beirne

M&M/Mars goes under the radar next year with a relaunch of Milky Way Dark, taps into the burgeoning taste for sour candy with Skittles and extends the Twix franchise. Meanwhile, rival Nestle will take on Skittles with fruit-flavored Oompas, launch a new chocolate candy bar and rename Loony Jerry and other Tangy Taffy candies following pressure from mental health advocates and former First Lady Rosalynn Carter.

Milky Way Midnight, a dark-chocolate bar with a midnight blue wrapper, targets 18-24 male, urban hipsters, eschewing the passe TV medium in favor of the Internet, billboards, bus sides and phone booths to create an aura of a mysterious, yet cool eating experience. Tagline: "Carpe Noctum," Latin for "Seize the Night." Dark has languished with $6 million in grocery, drug and mass sales, down 2.8% for the year ended July 18, per Information Resources Inc.

Also shipping early next year is Skittles Sours, Mars' first sour entry in an arena served mostly by small candy makers and grown primarily via word of mouth. M&M's Minis will arrive in a king-sized Mega Tube, Starburst Hard Candy will ship in tropical flavors, and Twix peanut butter returns after a brief appearance several years ago, targeting 6-17-year-olds and gatekeeper moms.

Starting November, Nestle's Willie Wonka division rolls out Oompas, which unlike the peanut butter confection available under the same name years ago, will be fruit-flavored pieces in the Wonka signature purple wrapper sporting Willie Wonka. Exploder, a l-oz. chocolate candy bar with crackling crystals inside, also rolls.

Nestle discontinued Tangy Taffy flavor names Loony Jerry, Weird Wally and Psycho Sam following a year-long campaign by the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill., which claimed they stigmatized mental illness. Nestle argued that the names are silly and playful, but NAMI alerted its Stigma Buster network of 7,000 members to e-mail corporate execs, and then the former first lady signed on. Before she was to write an op-ed piece for the L.A. Times, Nestle told e-mailers that the names will be discontinued, and packaging and marketing plans updated next year.