Candy-Lovers Remain True To Their Favorite Confectionary Choices

Whether it’s a Hershey’s bar, plain M&Ms, or Reese’s peanut butter cups, the sweet offerings of the convenience store and the office vending machine haven’t changed much over the years. Though American consumers often want everything that’s new, when it comes to chocolate, they’ll take the tried and true.

“If you look at the top 10 chocolate products, most of them have been around for the better part of last century,” said Susan Fussel, spokeswoman for the National Confectioners Association, “Those are definitely our favorites.”

The top sellers are a litany of familiar names such as M&Ms, Hershey, Reese, and KitKat that have stood the test of time. The classic Hershey’s bar has been around since 1900 - when it sold for a nickel - and the beloved Snickers since 1930. Overall, 65 percent of American candy brands have been around for more than 50 years, according to the NCA. It’s one area of consumerism that Americans refuse to update.

“Candy is an impulse buy,” said Michael Kinney, a Hershey Foods Corp. spokesman, “and most people have a short list of 10 to 12 candy products that they’re going to look for.” It’s difficult, he said, for people to add to or delete from that select list.

“We get e-mails all the time from people who are trying to track down a particular candy they loved as a kid because it gives a sense of youthfulness and nostalgia,” said Fussel. “They crave what they craved as a kid.”

Eighty-six year old Lucille Perleman of Manhattan still visits her local candy paradise, Sweets From Heaven, to satisfy her sweet tooth.

Ruwayn Murad grew up in Europe eating Lion Bars and they are still his favorite after 18 years in America. He buys the caramel and chocolate bar at specialty stores like Sweets From Heaven. “It’s a nostalgia thing,” he said. “It reminds me of a lot of good things in one little package.”

Consumers’ attachment to traditional candy bars means that new chocolate products don’t stand much of a chance in the marketplace, even though manufacturers are constantly trying out new products. The chocolate bar history book is littered with the corpses of “new!” candy bars past.

Hershey loyalists might remember the Mild and Mellow bar, the Rally bar, and the Butter Chip bar. These products, and more than a dozen others from Hershey, were introduced over the past century but failed to hook consumers.

Innovations by Nestle-USA and M&M/Mars have run into similar troubles. Remember Nestle’s Choco-lite? Or Mars’ peanut butter Snickers? Neither lasted long on the 7-Eleven shelf.

With this in mind, candy makers today tend to offer only gentle alterations on the old favorites. The new Milky Way Midnight alters the 1923 innovation with a dark chocolate overcoat, and the original 1928 Reese’s peanut butter cup ingredients were rearranged in 1998 to form ReeseSticks.

Whatever the combination, chocolate is American’s favorite flavor and annual consumption has risen to its current high of 12.2 pounds per person, according to the Department of Commerce.

“Chocolate is, for most people - when their sweet tooth comes calling - that’s what they want,” said Michael Yamaner, the government’s statistical analyst for the confectionery industry.

Americans won’t automatically disdain a new product. The Twix bar, a chocolate enrobed cookie-caramel combination, received a happy welcome when it arrived in the U.S. from Britain in 1979. But later variations that substituted the caramel layer with peanut butter, chocolate fudge, and cookies-and-cream didn’t catch on.

While Twix was a successful import, few chocolate confections are embraced outside their country of origin. American candy consumers prefer peanut flavors, while European chocolate shops brim with hazelnut and praline. Regional tastes even figure into variations in ingredients of the exact same candy. The Hershey’s bar sold abroad is creamier than the American favorite because, the company says, countries outside of North America prefer different flavor profiles.

And not everyone is stuck on the conventional hometown chocolate.

“When I visited confectioner’s shops in Europe, there were so many different types of chocolate and they were all good and none of them are available here.” said a confessed candy addict, Candice Brasell, a New Yorker who filled her suitcase with European varieties before returning home.

And kids just developing their chocolate habits are welcoming some recent innovations. Twelve-year-olds Jensen Lowe and David Himmel of Manhattan adore old-time favorites like Nestle Crunch and Charleston Chew, but they also have welcomed the new crispy M&Ms into the fold.