RSS Add-Me
A Letter to M&Ms
How has Mike Horshead effected (affected? I hate these words!) your life? Here is an early example
04-05-1988
Mars, Inc.
M & M Dept
High Street
Hackettstown, N.J. 07840
Dear Sirs,
Well, today is a red letter day (and that letter is M). I just purchased some M & Ms peanut and guess what I found. A red M & M!!!! Boy was I surprised. The last letter I wrote you (1985) didn't bring a real promising response concerning the fate of our little red candy-coates pal, but there he was, right in the palm of my hand. Three years isn't really a long time to wait for something as good as red Ms when you consider all the corporate decision making that probably went into this change.
Now, on to old business. In my last letter (1985) I complained about the imbalance of brown M & Ms to the colored one. We were talking a 3 to 2 ratio here but you said that the people you surveyed liked an abundance of brown. If that's true, why does all your advertising show brown in the minority? Is this something that Geraldo Revera needs to check into? If people like brown so much, give them 90% brown and one or two green ones.
The reason that this abundance of earth-tones bothers me so, is that whenever I want to display M & Ms in my house in a glass bowl (not that I live in a glass bowl) I have to pick out the renegade surplus browns and throw them in the neighbor's yard (that is why his dog is so fat). And all the time people say, "what a bright candy dish! Mine always looks so brown" So you see your survey is way off base. Now, the new business.........
1) How about blue or a nice purple color?
2) You have peanut M & Ms. How about raisin?
3) What is the correct pronounciation of M & M?
a) em and em
b) em en em
c) em ampersand em
My buddy Elmer and I have a box of Raisinettes riding on this (since we can't buy raisin M & Ms) (YET)
Red Ms Forever
Mike Horshead
Here is their informed response
Dear Mr. Horshead
Thank you for your letter and interest in "M&M's" Chocolate Candies. HOLIDAYS Chocolates were introduced at Christams 1985. The following Spring (1986) the pastel assortment was produced. As a result of the reaction to the Christmas HOLIDAYS Chocolates (1985/196) it was decided to reintroduce red into the color blend of "M&M's" Chocolate Candies in 1987. the color blue is used in the pastel assortment of HOLIDAYS Chocolates.
Red candies were dropped from the "M&M's" Chocolate Candies color blend in 1976. Although we were not using the red coloring that was controversial, we wanted to avoid consumer confusion and misplaced cencern about our products. We had used -- and are using again, those other red food colors which were and always have been permanently authorized by the FDA for use in foods.
A comparison of the color ration is shown below:
Present Color Ratio red yellow green orange tan brown
Plain 20% 20% 10% 10% 10% 30%
Peanut 20% 20% 20% 10% -- 30%
M&M/Mars maintains a fully-staffed test-kitchens who have the responsibility of developing new products (variations of other products and recipes). We are unable to tell you about any new varieties of M&M/Mars products until they are market-tested.
The "m" is pronounced the same way the letter "M" in the alphabet is pronounced. The word "and" seperates the two individual letter "m's". We realize of course, that local colloquialism's would change the articulation. Consequently, there is no "correct" or "incorrect" pronounciation.
Sincerely,
Ruth Mottram
Yup, Mike was instrumental in the advancement of the blue M. I'm still waiting for the raisins, though.
