Chocolate offensive now faces Minties backlash

Tomorrow's Cadbury chocolate charm offensive through Taranaki will now have to deal with a Minties backlash as well.

This week Cadbury admitted manufacture of New Zealand's iconic Minties lolly had shifted to Thailand in August and the resulting product was softer, chewier and whiter. Despite these supposed benefits, the change has upset many Minties lovers who enjoyed the harder, mintier and often misshapen New Zealand made sweets.

It is an attempt to placate other upset customers that sees a Cadbury truck roll into Waverley tomorrow to begin three days of chocolate giveaways in Taranaki.

This consumer coddling comes after choc-lovers across the country deserted Cadbury in droves when it began adding palm oil to its product.

Only after months of trying to explain the reason behind the move did Cadbury relent and drop the controversial palm oil ingredient from its recipe, reverting to a cocoa butter-only chocolate formula in late August.

Such a switch back is not going to happen with Minties because production has shifted to Thailand, said Cadbury spokesman Daniel Ellis.

"We do listen to what the public is saying and where we can we make changes. People told us they don't want palm oil in their Cadbury Dairy Milk so we're taking it out. People have said the early batches of Minties need more mint so we've added more mint flavour," he said.

That will please many Minties munchers who felt the new product was inferior to the old in a taste test yesterday.

As with other lolly exposes the Minties story attracted plenty of attention yesterday.

TV3 came to Taranaki to interview Tania Gecse, the woman who first noticed the change, and more than 140 people commented on the story on the Stuff news website.

"Cadbury's seems to have underestimated the extent to which consumers' brand loyalty depends on consistency and tradition," wrote one reader.

"You would think a company the size of Cadbury would learn from Coca-Cola's fallout with the American public for changing Coke's formula. Not to mention Cadbury's own backlash from the public for using palm oil in their chocolates," said another.

Other expressed dismay a story about a lolly was attracting so much comment while several said they would now eat Minties because they were softer.

Production of Mint Imperials, Curiously Strong Mints and Fruit Chews has also been shifted to Thailand. Mr Ellis said 90 per cent of New Zealand lollies will continue to be made here or in Australia.

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