Mars Attacks Saturated Fats
Mars U.K. threw down a big fat challenge to rival chocolate makers in the United Kingdom last week when they announced a newer, skinnier version of their namesake candy bar, as well as three other of their most popular confections.
Mars' (not Martian!) white lab coat employees spent more than 40,000 man hours figuring out how to make every bite of a Mars Bar, Snickers, Milky Way and Topic candies taste the same, smell the same, look the same and even feel the same, only with 15 percent less saturated fat.
If that “unprecedented scientific achievement” isn’t mind-blowing enough, they’ve challenged all other chocolate candy makers in the neighborhood to do the same. Mars says it’s “an industry-wide call to action” for competitors to follow their lead in reducing their products’ saturated fat content. Those are tough words from a big company that makes a lot of sweet goodies for a lot of people who probably won’t notice any difference, whether or not they’ve heard this news.
I contacted Hershey’s and Nestle’s to get their reactions, but my phone calls had not been returned by deadline for this piece.
Fat is money, isn't it? Mars invested in the less fatty version, also framing the project in terms of fives years, and the clincher, €10-million (Euros) which, being a bit generous, rounds up in U.S. dollars to almost $13 million. Sure, this is nice of Mars U.K. to watch over its market, to make sure we don’t all collapse from consuming too much of their good thing. Aside from losing their market to thick-walled arteries, what’s the payoff for Mars? This sounds like one of the spreadsheet devotees figured out that taking the fat out of the kitchen will put more of it in boardroom.
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