Necco Puts Fake Ingredients Back Into Candy After Customers Complain

When Necco Wafers, the dry-as-chalk candies beloved by many a septuagenarian, decided to change their original recipe to include "natural" flavors and colors, they thought they were just staying hip to the know. But the plan totally backfired, as thousands of angry customers hounded the company to go back to their original, artificial ways.

"Our normal mail volume probably went up twenty-fold," Necco VP Jeff Green told NPR. The vast majority of customers said something along the lines of, "You ruined my product, I will never buy anything from you again." People complained about everything: “The colors were bland. The taste was bland. My theory is that if it wasn’t broken, it shouldn’t have been fixed. They proved it," one lifelong fan told the Boston Globe. Sales dropped by 35 percent.

So, two years into an ill-fated taste experiment, the company is going back to their fake, sugary, original ways. Green guesses that the shift alienated Necco's "older demographic," a theory grandmothers across the nation empirically support. "When you're tampering with the family jewels for [the first time in] 150 years," Green said, "we expected some fallout. I don't think we expected it to be quite what it was."

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By Jamie Feldmar in Food on October 27, 2011 12:24 PM

Comments [rss]

Peanut_Butter

Wish I could get Mickey D's to bring back mystery meat McNuggets :(

SFNY

Isn't it "hip to the now"? "Know" doesn't make any sense. This is probably another one of those phrases that the internet is gonna make go sideways, like "say your peace" versus "say your piece."

Peanut_Butter

Mish-mash of hip to... and in the know?

RevDaniel

A friend once described their flavor to me as "stale lucky charm marshmallows", and I think he hit it right on the nose. That said, I still love Necco Wafers!

mikecherepko

I like that description, but I don't think they're sweet like lucky charm marshmallows. To me, it's like I'm finally enabled to eat elementary school chalk. (I also love Necco Wafers.)

www

This is the same company that makes the chalky Valentine hearts with the phrases on them - I wonder if they tried the same thing with those?

Len_Drexler

"These candies are chalky and unpleasant!" -Lurr, Ruler of the planet Omicron Persei 8

GentleGiant

Snide remarks about old people are always fun!

Len_Drexler

Not surprisingly the company had been acquired by a private equity firm a few years before the change.

mikecherepko

No, that is surprising. We associate private equity firms with using chemicals and shortcuts and efficiency at the expense of quality. We associate 150 year old firms with old ways.

Len_Drexler

I associate private equity firms with acquiring a business they know nothing about and making changes to boost profitability in the short term so they can flip the company for a profit.

mikecherepko

oh, well that's pretty ignorant.

Len_Drexler

You're right. No private equity firm in the history of the world has ever taken a business and driven it straight into the ground but not before loading it with debt and paying themselves a nice "management fee" and dividend. Maybe you would like to elaborate.

Peter

Some older vending machines will recognize a Necco wafer as a quarter, as they're nearly the same diameter.

mikecherepko

Good. There's a lot to be said for artificial. I appreciate the thought and engineering that go into making my food taste better through science.

angry_pickle

Thoughts, engineering, and science aren't all good.

mikecherepko

Of course not. But when they make a world of scientists and engineers attempt to make me like things more, I like things.

RobertMosesSupposesErroneously

The clove-flavored ones are the best! In ye olden days, clove and violet used to be much more common candy flavors (up there with peppermint, lemon, etc.) but now you can only find em in historic brands.