October 31, 2025 • 44 mins
This brand of candy – with crisp layers of peanut buttery toffee and a chocolatey coating – is almost as memorable for its marketing as it is its signature crunch. Anney and Lauren don’t fumble the science and history of Butterfinger.
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Speaker 1 (00:08):
Hello, and welcome to Saber production of iHeartRadio. I'm Ariese
and I'm Lauren vogel Baum. And today we have an
episode for you about Butterfinger. Yes, not a sponsor, nope,
but wow, wow, many wondrous ad campaigns, some of which
we'll talk about.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Oh yeah, oh yeah, I mean yeah, y'all reach out
you tell.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
Us, Yeah, Saber Butterfinger ad campaign could be great. A
lot of the things we could do well. I think
I know the answer, but I shall ask the question.
Was there any particular reason this was on your mind? Lauren? Yes? Uh?
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Yeah, so it is October. October has Halloween. Halloween is
a candy based holiday, among other things. And uh, we
have not done this candy yet. And you got real
excited when I suggested it. Yes, because long time listeners
of the show should know. I have five Halloween candies
(01:09):
that I must acquire or else who knows? Who knows?
Speaker 1 (01:14):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (01:15):
And and by a choir, you mean find in the
wild or be given, not purchase yourself.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
Exactly. I must find them. I cannot purchase them, which
has gotten more difficult after the panic.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Yeah, how are we doing this year?
Speaker 1 (01:38):
Not great?
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Oh no, I feel like this is a cabin in
the woods kind of thing.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
So no, I found three. I found three butterfinger I
have already gotten. Okay, I'm getting a little anxious, I guess.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Because you haven't slept very sleepy listeners.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
So if I sound a little off in this episode,
I'm just tired because I've been watching so many movies,
Halloween movies and trying to find this candy. But I
do love butterfingers me too. They are delicious. I have
loved them since being quite young, and they were they
(02:22):
were kind of like I know, we talked about this
in our one of my other candy episodes, I'm enjoy mounds.
They weren't given out as frequently where I would do
tricker treating when I was a kid, so they were
harder to come by, and my brothers liked them as
will Oh okay.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
So yeah, so it's more competition for them.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
Yeah yeah, but I have always loved butter fingers. I
just what is it they say?
Speaker 2 (02:49):
Christy, crunchy peanut buttery. Yeah yeah, and you know better
lay a finger on my butterfinger.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
Yep. Those commercials are burned into my brain forever again.
Wondrous ad campaigns that they have done, and I did
enjoy the history on this one where it was not
what I thought it was. But yeah, I'm a big fan.
And this is the fifth. This completes my Halloween. We've
(03:18):
done every other episode about the other candies, so this
is my last finger.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
You were you were a little bit mysterious about what
they were, and so I just kind of kept suggesting
topics and being like, I guess we'll get to them
all eventually.
Speaker 1 (03:34):
Heck, and here we are, here we are.
Speaker 2 (03:37):
Yeah, yeah, uh yeah, yeah, I love them too. I
love them too. I've got very fond memories of some
of these things. We're going to talk about in the
history section. We'll get into it then. But yeah, you
can see some of our other some of our other
candy episodes.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
Yes, peanut butter episode, sure, Chocolate yeah yeah, oh yes, Sugar. Yes,
I made like the most horrified face and I'm not
quite sure why, but yes.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
Yeah, they were. They were early episodes. And also, I mean,
the story of sugar is horrifying. So that's true, that's legit. Yep, yeah,
that's true.
Speaker 1 (04:26):
Also, listeners, you know we love it. Please write in
with your favorite candies? Are the ones you do Yeah,
I love those opinions. But I guess this brings us
to our question butter fingers what are they? Well?
Speaker 2 (04:47):
Butter Fingers are a brand of candy usually produced in
bar form, made up of a stack or a roll
of like super thin, crispy layers of toffee and peanut butter,
cut into a long rectangle and coated in soft milk
chocolatey stuff. It doesn't have enough cacao in it to
(05:08):
be called chocolate. It's chocolate. That's a joke from the
Drew Carry Show. I don't know why it's still in
my head. That's amazing deep custs, y'all. Anyway, The result
of this manufacturing process is a like a layer of
creamy chocolate coating and then this like crunch a candy
(05:32):
that melts into a sticky chew of like rich and
sweet and peanuty flavoring. Yeah, and it's deep burnt orange
in color, which is interesting. They're made in standard candy
bar sizes for sale at like grocery counters and other
impulse buy kind of areas, and then in smaller pieces
(05:53):
of varying shapes and sizes, often individually wrapped for handing
out at Halloween or otherwise for sharing. These can be
eaten as a snack or a treat, or chopped into
small bits and incorporated into desserts like maybe cookies or
ice cream sundaes, other baked or frozen goods. You know.
The brand does team up with other like prepackaged food
(06:15):
producers sometimes for co branded and or flavored products. Butterfingers
are a chocolate and peanut butter flavored candy that is
set apart by that interesting texture.
Speaker 1 (06:28):
It's like if.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
You're taking a walk and you've got that crunch of
fall leaves under your boots and someone somewhere as baking
chocolate chip cookies. So just like so you're hit by
just like this big sweetness, this big rich sweetness and
a really satisfying texture.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
I haven't had a butter finger in a minute, and
they're so nice.
Speaker 1 (06:59):
They're so nine and they are that's just so crunchy.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
I miss I miss the bbis a lot.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
Oh the bbes. We'll talk about the bbs. But yeah,
those were good.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
They were so good. Oh okay. The brand is currently
owned by Ferrero Group, which is that huge Italian suites manufacturer,
and Butterfingers currently come in in regular fifty four gram bars.
I'm not translating all of this to imperial. We can
(07:35):
all figure out what grams are anyway. Yeah, normal sized
candy bars that are fifty four grams. Multi packs of
fun size bars that are about a third of full size,
like eighteen grams each, and then multi packs of minis,
which are squares that are around a fifth of the
full size, about ten grams each, and then Butterfinger bits,
(07:57):
which are crumbles meant to be used in the aforemention
and like baked goods or as dessert toppers or something
like that. Butterfinger also does seasonal offerings for right now,
For for Halloween, they've got skull shaped bars a little
bit smaller than the standard bar, and they've got a
special flavor marshmallow butter Finger. It's apparently got like a
(08:19):
white chocolatey marshmallow flavored coating instead of the usual milk chocolate,
and apparently it tastes a little bit like a fluffer
utter sandwich. Huh okay, yeah, all right, yeah, I don't know,
y'all rite in uh To make them, the company basically
(08:41):
makes like a like a pliable sugar pliable liquid sugar
mixture and UH separately makes peanut butter and then stacks
them and layers the two together super thinly by twisting
and folding the stack using some highly proprietary machinery, you
wind up with long ropes of basically like thin sheets
(09:04):
of toffee greased with peanut butter, which are then cut
into whatever sizes, cooled down, and coated with a chocolatey waterfall.
The process to make a bar takes about an hour,
but I mean, you know, like they're making hundreds of
thousands at a time. As of twenty nineteen, the factory
that they were made in could do ten million bars
(09:24):
a day. No, there is an Unwrapped episode about it
from that time, and the machinery appears wildly efficient, like
even for candy machinery, I recommend unwrapped all the time.
(09:45):
Up until recently, back when ness Lee still owned them,
they were manufactured with some kind of flaked corn in
the batter for added crispness. It was listed as a
confection nurse corn flakes or as freeze dried corn flakes,
depending on where you were located. Since Ferrero bought them, though,
(10:07):
they've switched recipes and they no longer include corn but
a lot of homemade recipes. Do more on that in
just a second. The brand also makes branded ice cream
bars right now, around the size and shape of like
a large candy bar, like a king sized candy bar,
with a butterfinger flavored ice cream not entirely sure what
that means, but cool, and a layer of butterfinger candy
(10:29):
on top and then coated in chocolatey coating. Yeah, they
are manufactured along with some Baby Ruth and one hundred
grand ice cream bars by Wells Enterprises. And yes, there
are recipes for making your own butterfingers at home. So
smart pastry humans have looked at all of this and
(10:50):
have recommended ways of basically laminating layers of you know,
pliable hot melted sugar with sweetened ground peanuts and usually
cornflakes in order to make super thin layers. So in
pastry we've talked about lamination before. In pastry, lamination is
(11:11):
a technique where you spread or roll out your main
ingredient very thin, then layer on your secondary ingredient and
then fold, fold the whole thing over on itself and
roll it out again to make thinner layers, and then
fold and reroll and fold and reroll until you get many,
many super thin layers. This is what you do if
(11:35):
you're going to make croissants. You layered dough with cold
butter so that the thin layers will eventually like kind
of fry in the oven. Yeah, so cool. But for
candy making, you know, you want to keep your layers
warm because you're convincing a sugar mixture that's melted to
the soft ball stage to keep pliable. But yeah, same idea.
(11:56):
You wind up making this crispy crunchy layered filling by
laminade the candy.
Speaker 1 (12:03):
Pretty cool, Pretty cool.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
Well what about the nutrition, Oh, treats are nice.
Speaker 1 (12:11):
M M.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
I will say that this is one of the things
that I'm like, Well, it's got peanuts in it, so
it's a little better than some other things because that's
a source of protein.
Speaker 1 (12:23):
I don't remember that. Yeah, we do have some numbers
for you.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
We do. Okay, So as of right now, the company
makes about one billion, six hundred and twenty six million
butterfinger bars a year. YEPH Their Franklin Park, Illinois factory
can produce the fun size bars at a rate of
(12:56):
nine hundred and twenty two thousand a shift. Okay, m hm,
and total sales of butterfingers are over two hundred million
dollars a year.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
I knew it. I feel like everybody was trying to
tell me butter fingers weren't propular when I was a kid.
I just sensed it wasn't true.
Speaker 2 (13:32):
I feel like I feel like they were. They were
a little bit more rare, like they uh, and they
were sometimes more expensive, and they were sometimes like they
certainly went the fastest at my high school candy drives.
Like if you were selling butterfinger products, especially those babies,
you would sell out of those twice over before anything else.
Speaker 1 (13:57):
I know we'll discuss this later, but how much do
you think that has to do with the Simpsons? Oh?
Speaker 2 (14:02):
Oh man, I mean not nothing. I mean this was
I'm talking about school experience in the nineteen nineties, which
was prime Simpsons territory. But also they're just people like peanut,
butter and chocolate and they're crunchy.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
That's what I thought. I feel validated right now.
Speaker 2 (14:28):
I think both. I think both.
Speaker 1 (14:30):
Well, we are going to get into the Simpsons ad
campaign amongst other other things. Yeah, first we need to
get into a break for a quick word from our sponsors.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
And we're back. Thank you sponsor, Yes, thank you.
Speaker 1 (14:54):
Okay. So, the Curtis Candy Company out of Chicago first
started promoting their Butterfingers candy but in nineteen twenty three,
though the first trademark wasn't awarded until nineteen twenty eight.
The candy was first created in nineteen twenty two by
Auto Schneering.
Speaker 2 (15:10):
He had started up the company in nineteen sixteen. Curtis
was his mother's family name.
Speaker 1 (15:17):
And the name of the candy bar allegedly comes from
a popular term that was used to describe clumsy baseball
players at the time, butterfingers. The story goes that the
company held a contest, which is something we hear also
so often, Yeah yeah to name the candy, and a
baseball player suggested this name and one yeah, Sneering's company
(15:45):
also came up with the baby Ruth candy bar. So
seeing a baseball theme here. And I have to say
a good friend of my dad's he was like the
house that gave out the full sized candy bars, you know, yeah,
but they were baby rufs and he would only give
out the fun size The butter fingers I've always bought,
(16:08):
I don't have, like the baby ruths are good, but
I wanted the butter. I mean, you know, when you're
a kid, you have those strong opinions about things that
people are giving you free candy essentially, you know.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
Yeah, but couldn't you have really why this one?
Speaker 1 (16:27):
Yeah, exactly exactly. Both candy bars were apparently dropped from
planes as part of their first marketing campaign for them.
They had little parachutes and they were dropped over New York.
Had a newspaper reported on the chaos of it. This
(16:48):
sounds wild to me, but hey, yeah, maybe I can't
say for sure. I don't think the planes were flying
very high. But that also sounds like chaos, to be honest.
So it does. It does something else that kind of
(17:10):
surprised me talking about the ad campaigns with this this
candy bar. Shirley Temple promoted butterfingers in the nineteen thirty
four film Baby Take a Bow. And I just have
to say, can we take a second to just remember
about how often we talk about Shirley Temple on a
food show. She really she was out there, Sam past
(17:35):
she did she did. Wow. That's all I have to say.
Just take that in, just.
Speaker 2 (17:42):
Just note it just note it. Yeah, sure, And we
haven't even done an episode about the Shirley Temple Nope
cocktail yet, so here we are. Well. I want to
also note, actually that all of this happened right before
and during the Great Depression, which kicked off in nineteen
twenty nine. And apparently Sharing was just like a really
(18:06):
dependable workhorse, and his creditors really liked him, and he
just sort of shoved the company through the rough times.
In nineteen thirty three, he testified to a House committee
about the workforce about how he was making it all happen,
basically by being creative and doing more for his employees
(18:29):
and customers. Not less interesting, dude, I want to come
back to him in future episodes. He would wind up
passing away relatively young, in nineteen fifty three. But meanwhile,
in the nineteen thirties and forties, amidst a bunch of
like pop science buzz around the role of glucose and
(18:50):
dextros and energy production in our bodies. We talked a
little bit about this in our sports Drinks episode, our
Gatorade episode, but like there were a bunch of Nobel
prizes given about these discoveries during the first few decades
of the twentieth century. So amongst all of that, Curtis
Candy Company marketed Butterfinger as being like a good energizing
(19:14):
candy for like, you know, people engaging in sports. It was.
It was labeled as being rich in dextros.
Speaker 1 (19:26):
All right, yeah, okay.
Speaker 2 (19:29):
By the early nineteen sixties, they were selling multi bar
boxes specifically for households to give out to trigger treaters.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
Oh wow. Standard Brands Incorporated purchased Curtis Candy in nineteen
sixty four, and then in nineteen eighty one, Standard Brands
merged with Nibisco, and then in nineteen eighty eight, Butterfinger
was sold to Colberg, Kravis Roberts and Company. And it
was a pretty huge deal at the time. There was
a lot written about it. Two years later, in nineteen ninety,
(20:03):
Nessley purchased both Baby Ruth and Butterfinger. There is a
rumor that the original recipe for Butterfinger was lost during
all of these exchanges, all these coming exchanges. In this
version of events, Nesley did their best to recreate the recipe.
Speaker 2 (20:28):
I read that in a bunch of places. Could not
verify it in any way, but it's a very popular
rumor or myths perhaps.
Speaker 1 (20:37):
Yes, yes, indeed, but this brings us to our Simpsons aside. Yeah, okay,
So Bart Simpson, the cartoon character of the TV show
The Simpsons, appeared in his first butterfingers commercial in nineteen
eighty eight. And this was when The Simpsons was a
(20:57):
part of the Tracy Ullman Show.
Speaker 2 (20:59):
Yeah, it wasn't even its own show yet exactly.
Speaker 1 (21:04):
The ad introduced Bart's nerdy friend, Millhouse, who had not
previously been seen, and it had the line don't lay
a finger on my butterfinger, and the butterfinger was called
Nido and it was also labeled as one of the
four major food groups. And yeah, Simpson's characters were appearing
on butterfinger wrappers by nineteen ninety.
Speaker 2 (21:27):
Yeah it kind it kind of helps, like the golden
yellow of a butterfinger wrapper from the time and the
color of the Simpson's skin were basically the same color.
But yeah, no, they have done all kinds of marketing
with The Simpsons over the years, including apparently some one
hundred and fifty ad spots. The deal ran from nineteen
(21:51):
eighty eight through two thousand and one.
Speaker 1 (21:55):
Yes, and funnily enough, the next year In the season
thirteen episode Sweet and Sour Marge, which yep, came out
January January two thousand and two, Chief Wigham throws butterfingers
into fire are somebody does, and he says even the
fire won't take them. And the whole episode is about
(22:15):
how mrge is trying to get rid of sugar.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
Yeah. Yeah, and so they're burning all of the like
the like junk food in town and right right, and yeah,
Wigham is just like, like, man, even the fire doesn't
want these.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
Yeah, yes. And this was more of a joke about
how the contract was no more than anything else like that.
I think in the commentary, the DBD commentary, they were
just like, yeah, no, ill will It was just kind
of like.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
It's funny, Yeah, exactly exactly.
Speaker 1 (22:45):
And later that season the chalkboard gag. The chalkboard gag,
which is the thing you know, Bart writes on the
chalkboard during the intro because he's being punished for whatever
he's done, was I will not bite the hand that
feeds me butterfingers.
Speaker 2 (23:04):
Oh that's adorable, very cheeky, very Simpsons, very within the
concept of the marketing campaign to begin with. But yeah,
they were back together. Less than a decade later, there
was like an instant win game from twenty thirteen who
laid a finger on Bart's butterfinger And I don't know,
it was a whole thing.
Speaker 1 (23:24):
That's so funny, that's so funny. Well, butterfinger bebes, which
I always have associated with the Simpsons, and they were
like small sphear cole chocolate covered butterfinger filled candies that
were similar to whoppers if you know what that is. Yeah,
they came out in nineteen ninety two. Butterfinger Bebes were
(23:46):
taken off the shelves in two thousand and six, and
I saw a lot of posts that people just lamenting
this loss. Yeah, what's happened? So good and it's gone.
Speaker 2 (24:00):
I want to do my lost candid, Like why would
they take this nice thing away from us?
Speaker 1 (24:06):
What did we do? Well, here's a kind of very
specific case. German markets pulled Butterfingers off off the shelves
in nineteen ninety nine in response to a green Peace
campaign against GMO corn that was in butterfingers at the time.
Instead of changing anything, Nestlie just removed butterfingers from the
(24:29):
shelves in Germany. They're like, oh, too bad. Bites and
Many Bites debuted in two thousand and nine, and so
did Butterfinger Buzz, which were Butterfingers with caffeine that came
out around the same time.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
I don't feel like that's a good idea personally.
Speaker 1 (24:50):
I don't.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
No, it is a very voice communicated.
Speaker 1 (24:55):
How I feel.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
About it is a very two thousand and nine thing.
So yeah, yes, for sure. In twenty eleven, the brand
did this marketing campaign called the Butterfinger Defense League, which
I do not recall this, but y'all let me know.
So this marketing campaign teamed up television crime fighter personalities
(25:25):
Eric Estrada lou f for Rigno and Charisma Carpenter, you
know from like Chips and The Incredible Hulk and Buffy.
Speaker 1 (25:35):
Oh okay, yeah, no, I don't remember that at all.
Speaker 2 (25:39):
Nope, Nope, me neither. Apparently it was a thing that happened.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
They really did. The marketing of Butterfingers could just be
its own thing. We aren't even talking about all of them.
Speaker 2 (25:56):
We're breezing through, but that one was specific enough that
I really wanted to know.
Speaker 1 (26:03):
Yeah, as is this one? Oh good? When everyone was
talking about the end of the World and the mind calendar.
In twenty twelve, Butterfingers responded with an ad campaign they
labeled Barmageddon. It apparently involved a QR code, tales of
(26:26):
missing butterfingers, and they put up a crop circle in Manhattan, Kansas.
Speaker 2 (26:32):
Okay uh.
Speaker 1 (26:34):
A Butterfinger spokesperson said at the time, it's no coincidence
that a mysterious crop circle appeared on the same day
that Butterfinger bars disappeared from Moscow to Manhattan. Get your
butterfinger bars now, as there's little time left. Barmageddon is
officially here. Exclamation point wow. The company also ran a
(27:00):
Facebook contest for five thousand dollars for anyone who could
connect Butterfingers, Aliens and the Mayans.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
Oh my goodness.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
Again listeners, right I miss I missed this one too.
Speaker 2 (27:15):
Yep, yep, me too. The uh well, yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:23):
They were.
Speaker 2 (27:23):
They were big on social media in like those relatively
early social media days.
Speaker 1 (27:30):
Yeah they were. They were trying things.
Speaker 2 (27:35):
They were, they were trying many things.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
In twenty eighteen, Neslei sold Butterfingers and there are other
candies to Ferrero Spa for two point eight billion dollars.
Speaker 2 (27:52):
Yeah. Yeah, Neslie sold their entire confectionery line off to
Ferrero control of butterfingers specifically, and a lot of them.
I think I went to this Chicago based company that
Ferrero had bought a couple of years previously called Ferreira,
no relation, but the acquisition more than doubled Ferreira's business
(28:16):
portfolio just a you know, even more candy making in Chicago.
Speaker 1 (28:22):
Wild. I just feel that they are trying to purposely
confuse as poor food podcasters. It's Ferrero, and for I
don't like that at all. That's all I'm going to say.
Speaker 2 (28:32):
There was a great Chicago Tribune article that really laid
it out for me, and thank you to them because
I was a little lost and they were like, no, no, no,
I see you Lord and Vogel Bomb.
Speaker 1 (28:47):
It is confusing. In fact, Oh well, this brings us
to some drama because that is also the year that
the recipe changed, which you know, if you've been listening
to the show, people have opinions about that. They have
really strong opinions about it.
Speaker 2 (29:08):
Yeah. Okay, so this was Ferrero's Better Butterfinger campaign. They
were trying to improve what was, according to them, a
recipe that had deteriorated. In quality over the years, leading
to lagging sales. So basically they tried to like improve
the ingredients a tad. They added more cocoa and milk
(29:31):
to the chocolate coating. They removed a couple of like
high processed ingredients. Instead of ground roasted peanuts, the wrappers
now list both peanuts and peanut flour. Not sure entirely
what that's about. They did remove molasses and corn ingredients
(29:52):
from the recipe, and they also revamped the packaging with
a brighter less orange yellow yellow and a double layer
for freshness. And people were made.
Speaker 1 (30:07):
Oh yes, furious. Furious Food and Wine called the new
butterfinger a quote elevated butterfinger experience. In twenty nineteen, the
new campaign heralding a better butterfinger was met with a
(30:28):
lot of derision from fans. A petition for bringing back
the original butterfinger garnered over seven thousand signatures. You know,
I'm sure people are still I'm sure there are still
some people to this day that are like, yeah, they
haven't let go.
Speaker 2 (30:48):
Oh no, I'm positive, I am absolutely positive. If you
are one of them, let us know.
Speaker 1 (30:54):
Yes, we want.
Speaker 2 (30:56):
To hear all about all about your good memories. But yeah, no,
I mean the Butterfinger brand is really just going for it,
especially recently. Like I think that those ice cream bars
only launched this year twenty twenty five. This spring, they
released a new flavor for the first time in a
(31:16):
very long time. It was limited edition. It was salted
Caramel Butterfinger. It had like a tan chocolatey coating and
a strip of salted caramel inside the bar. I think
based on its popularity, they did the aforementioned marshmallow Butterfinger
for fall. Also in both twenty twenty four and twenty
(31:39):
twenty five, they've partnered with Heidi Klum to like trick
out her Halloween party with branded treats. And I didn't
mean for that to be a whole pun sentence, but
I just I just write these things without realizing it,
and then I'm not going to change it. No, that'd
be silly, it would anyway. Klume is like big into Halloween.
(32:02):
She's had really spectacular costumes and has been holding big parties.
This is like the twenty fourth year of her holding
really big Halloween parties apparently. And yeah, yeah, Butterfinger partnered
with her to have Butterfingers there, And I don't know,
they're doing like a Butterfinger teeny cocktail with peanut butter
(32:23):
whiskey and notes of butterscotch and chocolate. So yeah, oh okay, yeah,
yeah sounds nice.
Speaker 1 (32:36):
I'm sure.
Speaker 2 (32:37):
I'm sure that for someone who would be into that,
it's great. I hope that it finds it's intended recipient. Yeah, huh, yeah, okay,
And so a thing that I didn't mention earlier, but
I kind of meant to work in here and the
caramel thing reminded me. I'm pretty sure that at some
point in the early to mid days of the butter
(33:00):
Finger Bar there was a bit of caramel in the bar,
but I'm not sure where and how, and I couldn't
I couldn't really figure it out.
Speaker 1 (33:13):
Yeah, I have to say this was kind of a
surprising episode in terms of that where a lot of
times when we do a product or a company, they
have so many resources because they're telling their company story,
whether or not that's true not, but there's a lot
(33:36):
of stuff you can find. Yeah, Yeah, like this one
was a little a little sparse, Yeah, what I could find.
Speaker 2 (33:43):
Yeah, And I'm wondering, I'm wondering if it's that like
rapid fire exchange of company assets during that like one
really short period where maybe a bunch of stuff did
kind of get lost. Yeah, but yeah, right, because then
I was arguing with myself like was there a layer
of caramel or were they talking about like the toffee
as a caramel. You know, I don't, I don't have
(34:04):
to know.
Speaker 1 (34:06):
But here we are, here, we are, We've we've done
all five of my candies. Yeah, I feel good.
Speaker 2 (34:17):
Yeah. I got to mention Eric Castrada loop for Rick
knowing Charisma Carpenter in the same sentence.
Speaker 1 (34:25):
Yeah, that's pretty excellent. And again, we didn't even get
into all of their ad campaigns. They are they have
done some stuff. Yeah, if you want to look it up,
the ad campaign part, you can find a lot.
Speaker 2 (34:45):
Of information, certainly.
Speaker 1 (34:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (34:48):
Yeah, I mean, if if you guys really want us
to just recite ad slogans, I guess we could. But
watching the but watching watching the commercials is probably worth
your time if that's the kind of nostalgia that you're into,
because they are wacky.
Speaker 1 (35:05):
Yeah, and I did read that this was a big
nostalgia candy. So I'm curious because I personally, I feel
like there's my Dad's candy like whoppers. That's not bad,
but that's a very like hymn candy. And now I'm
wondering if I'm entering the oh do young people eat
(35:26):
butter fingers? Is it? Am? I?
Speaker 2 (35:29):
Are you the old person now?
Speaker 1 (35:33):
Yeah? So younger younger listeners right in?
Speaker 2 (35:36):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (35:36):
What am I going through?
Speaker 2 (35:38):
Yeah? True and truly the scariest part about Halloween?
Speaker 1 (35:43):
That's right, that's right, But I at least have a
butter finger to get me through.
Speaker 2 (35:48):
Well, that's good. I'm really glad.
Speaker 1 (35:50):
Mm hmm. Well, I guess that's what we have to
say about butterfingers for now. It is. Oh.
Speaker 2 (35:56):
We would indeed love to hear from y all, though,
and we do already have some listener mouth for you,
which we will get into as soon as we get
back from one more quick break for a word from
our sponsors.
Speaker 1 (36:16):
And we're back.
Speaker 2 (36:16):
Thank you, sponsor, Yes, thank you, And we're back with this.
Speaker 1 (36:40):
Yeah, it's hard to communicate those kind of things, but
I think you did a good.
Speaker 2 (36:43):
Job as I just tried to follow along with you,
and I think it worked. Maybe Andrew is helping us.
Speaker 1 (36:52):
Out always he always is. Okay, so we got a
follow up email from Haley, who is our cookie experiment tress.
That's a lot of things, and we recently read Haley's
email on here and here is a follow up another
(37:16):
double whammy. I was just listening to the provolone episode
and thinking about how I could put some in a
cookie for a cheese pull. Then provel was mentioned. I'm
originally from Missouri and spent a few years living in
Saint Louis. Provel is widely used there, specifically at a
pizza chain called Emaos. I miss that salty, creamy, ultra
(37:39):
processed nonsense every day, but it is, as are most things,
very divisive. I was writing that response in my head
when suddenly my last email was being read. I think
I've become a little numbed by all the weird things
I've eaten, because, yeah, that sentence was completely bonker. Lol.
(38:02):
Some Internet people have been downright mean about my opinion, surprise, surprise.
But I've learned a lot and get to eat cookies
every day for work and for the chair on top.
My mom is a picture framer, so I'll absolutely have
her memorialize that quote for me. Much love and big
cookie dreams. That's so funny. That's excellent. That's excellent. So
(38:28):
if you missed that listener mail, it was basically about putting.
It was the most funny, calm, strange sentence I've ever read.
That was just like, yeah, there were peppers in there,
and it was okay, but it was also mushy and
very unremarkable. And I think I'm very glad that you're
(38:50):
getting it framed. I think you should.
Speaker 2 (38:52):
Yeah, oh, absolutely, it is. It is a thing of
strange beauty.
Speaker 1 (38:57):
It is, it is, and as your work sounds like
it is. Yeah, I would love to hear if you
put profila and a cookie or provolone.
Speaker 2 (39:13):
Yeah, yeah, if you're getting a cheese pull out of
a cookie.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
I am fascinated by this, definitely, definitely. We always love
hearing about your cookie combinations. But I, like I said
in that episode, I desperately want to talk about it
because I've never heard of it, and people yeah yeah,
(39:38):
out of the gate immediately had strong opinions, and I
just really I want to know more. So let us know.
We love hearing updates about your cookies. Yeah, if you
do get that quote framed, please send us a picture.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
Yes, yes, yes, yes, oh man, oh yeah, I want
to learn more about pravel too anyway, okay U William wrote,
during October of twenty twenty four, my wife and I
visited our daughter and son in law in Japan. Spent
the month eating great food. In Japan and South Korea.
The Japanese love Halloween. Every store has an elaborate display.
(40:20):
The attached photo shows, however, that, like the logos on
many T shirts, some meaning gets jumbled in translation. This
was taken in the lobby of a small hotel we
stayed at in rural Japan. Note it's a Christmas tree
adorned with a witch's hat on top, with pumpkins and
ghosts adorning the branches. Thought it might make you smile,
(40:44):
And yes, yep, that is absolutely a Christmas tree. It
is like a green Christmas tree with white fake snow
on it, and it is decorated like a Halloween tree. Yes,
but there it's all like orange, purple and white in theme.
Speaker 1 (41:03):
I have never thought of putting a witch's hat on
top of a Christmas tree. Why now I'm very angry
at my right because that looks excellent.
Speaker 2 (41:13):
I mean because it's one of those you know, pointy
triangular like cone shaped hats with the wide rim on
the bottom and it just fits the shape of the tree.
It's also at like this very specific, slight jaunty angle
that I think is really adding something.
Speaker 1 (41:30):
I agree. I think it's really cute, it's beautiful. It
did bring us f out to my face, so thank you.
I won't go into it too much now, but I
have talked before about when I was in Japan, they
do how they do hallowing up. They have all of
these food promotions, people dress up, but it felt much
(41:53):
more and people from Japan please write in because I
was a tourist there, but it felt much more like
it was like, look at this strange thing Americans do.
Let us also do it. But it was cool. I mean,
they just had so many Being in Japan during Halloween,
I was so glad that that was the time I went.
(42:15):
It was just.
Speaker 2 (42:16):
Really cool, especially being a Halloween person as you are.
Speaker 1 (42:20):
Yeah exactly, yeah exactly. I went to a couple of
hunted houses. Yeah, so many, like very We've talked about
it before on the show, but just they go all
out on the kind of Halloween promotion with food. So
I had a lot of like Halloween foods. But it
was cool and I would love to hear from other
(42:45):
listeners about it, about what you have seen, what you
have done. Oh yeah, yeah, what's going on?
Speaker 2 (42:52):
Yeah from anywhere? Yeah, not only Japan. Right, because although
if you are listening to this on the day it
comes out, I believe it's Halloween, I can't tell the future.
But so that means that you know very soon the
Halloween season is hypothetically over for the year. But as
we've said before, the holiday lives in our hearts. So yes,
(43:15):
so feel free to write in.
Speaker 1 (43:18):
Yes, absolutely, do not let those constraints stop you, because
we love it anytime. Thank you so much to both
of those listeners for writing in. If you would like
to write to us, you can Our email is hello
at saborpod dot com.
Speaker 2 (43:34):
We're also on social media. You can find us on
Instagram and blue Sky at saber pod, and we do
hope to hear from you. Savor is production of iHeartRadio.
For more podcasts my Heart Radio, you can visit the
iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your
favorite shows. Thanks us always to our super producers Dylan
Fagan and Andrew Howard. Thanks to you for listening, and
(43:55):
we hope that lots more good things are coming your way.
Hello, and welcome to Saber production of iHeartRadio. I'm Ariese
and I'm Lauren vogel Baum. And today we have an
episode for you about Butterfinger. Yes, not a sponsor, nope,
but wow, wow, many wondrous ad campaigns, some of which
we'll talk about.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Oh yeah, oh yeah, I mean yeah, y'all reach out
you tell.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
Us, Yeah, Saber Butterfinger ad campaign could be great. A
lot of the things we could do well. I think
I know the answer, but I shall ask the question.
Was there any particular reason this was on your mind? Lauren? Yes? Uh?
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Yeah, so it is October. October has Halloween. Halloween is
a candy based holiday, among other things. And uh, we
have not done this candy yet. And you got real
excited when I suggested it. Yes, because long time listeners
of the show should know. I have five Halloween candies
(01:09):
that I must acquire or else who knows? Who knows?
Speaker 1 (01:14):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (01:15):
And and by a choir, you mean find in the
wild or be given, not purchase yourself.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
Exactly. I must find them. I cannot purchase them, which
has gotten more difficult after the panic.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Yeah, how are we doing this year?
Speaker 1 (01:38):
Not great?
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Oh no, I feel like this is a cabin in
the woods kind of thing.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
So no, I found three. I found three butterfinger I
have already gotten. Okay, I'm getting a little anxious, I guess.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Because you haven't slept very sleepy listeners.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
So if I sound a little off in this episode,
I'm just tired because I've been watching so many movies,
Halloween movies and trying to find this candy. But I
do love butterfingers me too. They are delicious. I have
loved them since being quite young, and they were they
(02:22):
were kind of like I know, we talked about this
in our one of my other candy episodes, I'm enjoy mounds.
They weren't given out as frequently where I would do
tricker treating when I was a kid, so they were
harder to come by, and my brothers liked them as
will Oh okay.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
So yeah, so it's more competition for them.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
Yeah yeah, but I have always loved butter fingers. I
just what is it they say?
Speaker 2 (02:49):
Christy, crunchy peanut buttery. Yeah yeah, and you know better
lay a finger on my butterfinger.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
Yep. Those commercials are burned into my brain forever again.
Wondrous ad campaigns that they have done, and I did
enjoy the history on this one where it was not
what I thought it was. But yeah, I'm a big fan.
And this is the fifth. This completes my Halloween. We've
(03:18):
done every other episode about the other candies, so this
is my last finger.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
You were you were a little bit mysterious about what
they were, and so I just kind of kept suggesting
topics and being like, I guess we'll get to them
all eventually.
Speaker 1 (03:34):
Heck, and here we are, here we are.
Speaker 2 (03:37):
Yeah, yeah, uh yeah, yeah, I love them too. I
love them too. I've got very fond memories of some
of these things. We're going to talk about in the
history section. We'll get into it then. But yeah, you
can see some of our other some of our other
candy episodes.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
Yes, peanut butter episode, sure, Chocolate yeah yeah, oh yes, Sugar. Yes,
I made like the most horrified face and I'm not
quite sure why, but yes.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
Yeah, they were. They were early episodes. And also, I mean,
the story of sugar is horrifying. So that's true, that's legit. Yep, yeah,
that's true.
Speaker 1 (04:26):
Also, listeners, you know we love it. Please write in
with your favorite candies? Are the ones you do Yeah,
I love those opinions. But I guess this brings us
to our question butter fingers what are they? Well?
Speaker 2 (04:47):
Butter Fingers are a brand of candy usually produced in
bar form, made up of a stack or a roll
of like super thin, crispy layers of toffee and peanut butter,
cut into a long rectangle and coated in soft milk
chocolatey stuff. It doesn't have enough cacao in it to
(05:08):
be called chocolate. It's chocolate. That's a joke from the
Drew Carry Show. I don't know why it's still in
my head. That's amazing deep custs, y'all. Anyway, The result
of this manufacturing process is a like a layer of
creamy chocolate coating and then this like crunch a candy
(05:32):
that melts into a sticky chew of like rich and
sweet and peanuty flavoring. Yeah, and it's deep burnt orange
in color, which is interesting. They're made in standard candy
bar sizes for sale at like grocery counters and other
impulse buy kind of areas, and then in smaller pieces
(05:53):
of varying shapes and sizes, often individually wrapped for handing
out at Halloween or otherwise for sharing. These can be
eaten as a snack or a treat, or chopped into
small bits and incorporated into desserts like maybe cookies or
ice cream sundaes, other baked or frozen goods. You know.
The brand does team up with other like prepackaged food
(06:15):
producers sometimes for co branded and or flavored products. Butterfingers
are a chocolate and peanut butter flavored candy that is
set apart by that interesting texture.
Speaker 1 (06:28):
It's like if.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
You're taking a walk and you've got that crunch of
fall leaves under your boots and someone somewhere as baking
chocolate chip cookies. So just like so you're hit by
just like this big sweetness, this big rich sweetness and
a really satisfying texture.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
I haven't had a butter finger in a minute, and
they're so nice.
Speaker 1 (06:59):
They're so nine and they are that's just so crunchy.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
I miss I miss the bbis a lot.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
Oh the bbes. We'll talk about the bbs. But yeah,
those were good.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
They were so good. Oh okay. The brand is currently
owned by Ferrero Group, which is that huge Italian suites manufacturer,
and Butterfingers currently come in in regular fifty four gram bars.
I'm not translating all of this to imperial. We can
(07:35):
all figure out what grams are anyway. Yeah, normal sized
candy bars that are fifty four grams. Multi packs of
fun size bars that are about a third of full size,
like eighteen grams each, and then multi packs of minis,
which are squares that are around a fifth of the
full size, about ten grams each, and then Butterfinger bits,
(07:57):
which are crumbles meant to be used in the aforemention
and like baked goods or as dessert toppers or something
like that. Butterfinger also does seasonal offerings for right now,
For for Halloween, they've got skull shaped bars a little
bit smaller than the standard bar, and they've got a
special flavor marshmallow butter Finger. It's apparently got like a
(08:19):
white chocolatey marshmallow flavored coating instead of the usual milk chocolate,
and apparently it tastes a little bit like a fluffer
utter sandwich. Huh okay, yeah, all right, yeah, I don't know,
y'all rite in uh To make them, the company basically
(08:41):
makes like a like a pliable sugar pliable liquid sugar
mixture and UH separately makes peanut butter and then stacks
them and layers the two together super thinly by twisting
and folding the stack using some highly proprietary machinery, you
wind up with long ropes of basically like thin sheets
(09:04):
of toffee greased with peanut butter, which are then cut
into whatever sizes, cooled down, and coated with a chocolatey waterfall.
The process to make a bar takes about an hour,
but I mean, you know, like they're making hundreds of
thousands at a time. As of twenty nineteen, the factory
that they were made in could do ten million bars
(09:24):
a day. No, there is an Unwrapped episode about it
from that time, and the machinery appears wildly efficient, like
even for candy machinery, I recommend unwrapped all the time.
(09:45):
Up until recently, back when ness Lee still owned them,
they were manufactured with some kind of flaked corn in
the batter for added crispness. It was listed as a
confection nurse corn flakes or as freeze dried corn flakes,
depending on where you were located. Since Ferrero bought them, though,
(10:07):
they've switched recipes and they no longer include corn but
a lot of homemade recipes. Do more on that in
just a second. The brand also makes branded ice cream
bars right now, around the size and shape of like
a large candy bar, like a king sized candy bar,
with a butterfinger flavored ice cream not entirely sure what
that means, but cool, and a layer of butterfinger candy
(10:29):
on top and then coated in chocolatey coating. Yeah, they
are manufactured along with some Baby Ruth and one hundred
grand ice cream bars by Wells Enterprises. And yes, there
are recipes for making your own butterfingers at home. So
smart pastry humans have looked at all of this and
(10:50):
have recommended ways of basically laminating layers of you know,
pliable hot melted sugar with sweetened ground peanuts and usually
cornflakes in order to make super thin layers. So in
pastry we've talked about lamination before. In pastry, lamination is
(11:11):
a technique where you spread or roll out your main
ingredient very thin, then layer on your secondary ingredient and
then fold, fold the whole thing over on itself and
roll it out again to make thinner layers, and then
fold and reroll and fold and reroll until you get many,
many super thin layers. This is what you do if
(11:35):
you're going to make croissants. You layered dough with cold
butter so that the thin layers will eventually like kind
of fry in the oven. Yeah, so cool. But for
candy making, you know, you want to keep your layers
warm because you're convincing a sugar mixture that's melted to
the soft ball stage to keep pliable. But yeah, same idea.
(11:56):
You wind up making this crispy crunchy layered filling by
laminade the candy.
Speaker 1 (12:03):
Pretty cool, Pretty cool.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
Well what about the nutrition, Oh, treats are nice.
Speaker 1 (12:11):
M M.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
I will say that this is one of the things
that I'm like, Well, it's got peanuts in it, so
it's a little better than some other things because that's
a source of protein.
Speaker 1 (12:23):
I don't remember that. Yeah, we do have some numbers
for you.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
We do. Okay, So as of right now, the company
makes about one billion, six hundred and twenty six million
butterfinger bars a year. YEPH Their Franklin Park, Illinois factory
can produce the fun size bars at a rate of
(12:56):
nine hundred and twenty two thousand a shift. Okay, m hm,
and total sales of butterfingers are over two hundred million
dollars a year.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
I knew it. I feel like everybody was trying to
tell me butter fingers weren't propular when I was a kid.
I just sensed it wasn't true.
Speaker 2 (13:32):
I feel like I feel like they were. They were
a little bit more rare, like they uh, and they
were sometimes more expensive, and they were sometimes like they
certainly went the fastest at my high school candy drives.
Like if you were selling butterfinger products, especially those babies,
you would sell out of those twice over before anything else.
Speaker 1 (13:57):
I know we'll discuss this later, but how much do
you think that has to do with the Simpsons? Oh?
Speaker 2 (14:02):
Oh man, I mean not nothing. I mean this was
I'm talking about school experience in the nineteen nineties, which
was prime Simpsons territory. But also they're just people like peanut,
butter and chocolate and they're crunchy.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
That's what I thought. I feel validated right now.
Speaker 2 (14:28):
I think both. I think both.
Speaker 1 (14:30):
Well, we are going to get into the Simpsons ad
campaign amongst other other things. Yeah, first we need to
get into a break for a quick word from our sponsors.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
And we're back. Thank you sponsor, Yes, thank you.
Speaker 1 (14:54):
Okay. So, the Curtis Candy Company out of Chicago first
started promoting their Butterfingers candy but in nineteen twenty three,
though the first trademark wasn't awarded until nineteen twenty eight.
The candy was first created in nineteen twenty two by
Auto Schneering.
Speaker 2 (15:10):
He had started up the company in nineteen sixteen. Curtis
was his mother's family name.
Speaker 1 (15:17):
And the name of the candy bar allegedly comes from
a popular term that was used to describe clumsy baseball
players at the time, butterfingers. The story goes that the
company held a contest, which is something we hear also
so often, Yeah yeah to name the candy, and a
baseball player suggested this name and one yeah, Sneering's company
(15:45):
also came up with the baby Ruth candy bar. So
seeing a baseball theme here. And I have to say
a good friend of my dad's he was like the
house that gave out the full sized candy bars, you know, yeah,
but they were baby rufs and he would only give
out the fun size The butter fingers I've always bought,
(16:08):
I don't have, like the baby ruths are good, but
I wanted the butter. I mean, you know, when you're
a kid, you have those strong opinions about things that
people are giving you free candy essentially, you know.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
Yeah, but couldn't you have really why this one?
Speaker 1 (16:27):
Yeah, exactly exactly. Both candy bars were apparently dropped from
planes as part of their first marketing campaign for them.
They had little parachutes and they were dropped over New York.
Had a newspaper reported on the chaos of it. This
(16:48):
sounds wild to me, but hey, yeah, maybe I can't
say for sure. I don't think the planes were flying
very high. But that also sounds like chaos, to be honest.
So it does. It does something else that kind of
(17:10):
surprised me talking about the ad campaigns with this this
candy bar. Shirley Temple promoted butterfingers in the nineteen thirty
four film Baby Take a Bow. And I just have
to say, can we take a second to just remember
about how often we talk about Shirley Temple on a
food show. She really she was out there, Sam past
(17:35):
she did she did. Wow. That's all I have to say.
Just take that in, just.
Speaker 2 (17:42):
Just note it just note it. Yeah, sure, And we
haven't even done an episode about the Shirley Temple Nope
cocktail yet, so here we are. Well. I want to
also note, actually that all of this happened right before
and during the Great Depression, which kicked off in nineteen
twenty nine. And apparently Sharing was just like a really
(18:06):
dependable workhorse, and his creditors really liked him, and he
just sort of shoved the company through the rough times.
In nineteen thirty three, he testified to a House committee
about the workforce about how he was making it all happen,
basically by being creative and doing more for his employees
(18:29):
and customers. Not less interesting, dude, I want to come
back to him in future episodes. He would wind up
passing away relatively young, in nineteen fifty three. But meanwhile,
in the nineteen thirties and forties, amidst a bunch of
like pop science buzz around the role of glucose and
(18:50):
dextros and energy production in our bodies. We talked a
little bit about this in our sports Drinks episode, our
Gatorade episode, but like there were a bunch of Nobel
prizes given about these discoveries during the first few decades
of the twentieth century. So amongst all of that, Curtis
Candy Company marketed Butterfinger as being like a good energizing
(19:14):
candy for like, you know, people engaging in sports. It was.
It was labeled as being rich in dextros.
Speaker 1 (19:26):
All right, yeah, okay.
Speaker 2 (19:29):
By the early nineteen sixties, they were selling multi bar
boxes specifically for households to give out to trigger treaters.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
Oh wow. Standard Brands Incorporated purchased Curtis Candy in nineteen
sixty four, and then in nineteen eighty one, Standard Brands
merged with Nibisco, and then in nineteen eighty eight, Butterfinger
was sold to Colberg, Kravis Roberts and Company. And it
was a pretty huge deal at the time. There was
a lot written about it. Two years later, in nineteen ninety,
(20:03):
Nessley purchased both Baby Ruth and Butterfinger. There is a
rumor that the original recipe for Butterfinger was lost during
all of these exchanges, all these coming exchanges. In this
version of events, Nesley did their best to recreate the recipe.
Speaker 2 (20:28):
I read that in a bunch of places. Could not
verify it in any way, but it's a very popular
rumor or myths perhaps.
Speaker 1 (20:37):
Yes, yes, indeed, but this brings us to our Simpsons aside. Yeah, okay,
So Bart Simpson, the cartoon character of the TV show
The Simpsons, appeared in his first butterfingers commercial in nineteen
eighty eight. And this was when The Simpsons was a
(20:57):
part of the Tracy Ullman Show.
Speaker 2 (20:59):
Yeah, it wasn't even its own show yet exactly.
Speaker 1 (21:04):
The ad introduced Bart's nerdy friend, Millhouse, who had not
previously been seen, and it had the line don't lay
a finger on my butterfinger, and the butterfinger was called
Nido and it was also labeled as one of the
four major food groups. And yeah, Simpson's characters were appearing
on butterfinger wrappers by nineteen ninety.
Speaker 2 (21:27):
Yeah it kind it kind of helps, like the golden
yellow of a butterfinger wrapper from the time and the
color of the Simpson's skin were basically the same color.
But yeah, no, they have done all kinds of marketing
with The Simpsons over the years, including apparently some one
hundred and fifty ad spots. The deal ran from nineteen
(21:51):
eighty eight through two thousand and one.
Speaker 1 (21:55):
Yes, and funnily enough, the next year In the season
thirteen episode Sweet and Sour Marge, which yep, came out
January January two thousand and two, Chief Wigham throws butterfingers
into fire are somebody does, and he says even the
fire won't take them. And the whole episode is about
(22:15):
how mrge is trying to get rid of sugar.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
Yeah. Yeah, and so they're burning all of the like
the like junk food in town and right right, and yeah,
Wigham is just like, like, man, even the fire doesn't
want these.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
Yeah, yes. And this was more of a joke about
how the contract was no more than anything else like that.
I think in the commentary, the DBD commentary, they were
just like, yeah, no, ill will It was just kind
of like.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
It's funny, Yeah, exactly exactly.
Speaker 1 (22:45):
And later that season the chalkboard gag. The chalkboard gag,
which is the thing you know, Bart writes on the
chalkboard during the intro because he's being punished for whatever
he's done, was I will not bite the hand that
feeds me butterfingers.
Speaker 2 (23:04):
Oh that's adorable, very cheeky, very Simpsons, very within the
concept of the marketing campaign to begin with. But yeah,
they were back together. Less than a decade later, there
was like an instant win game from twenty thirteen who
laid a finger on Bart's butterfinger And I don't know,
it was a whole thing.
Speaker 1 (23:24):
That's so funny, that's so funny. Well, butterfinger bebes, which
I always have associated with the Simpsons, and they were
like small sphear cole chocolate covered butterfinger filled candies that
were similar to whoppers if you know what that is. Yeah,
they came out in nineteen ninety two. Butterfinger Bebes were
(23:46):
taken off the shelves in two thousand and six, and
I saw a lot of posts that people just lamenting
this loss. Yeah, what's happened? So good and it's gone.
Speaker 2 (24:00):
I want to do my lost candid, Like why would
they take this nice thing away from us?
Speaker 1 (24:06):
What did we do? Well, here's a kind of very
specific case. German markets pulled Butterfingers off off the shelves
in nineteen ninety nine in response to a green Peace
campaign against GMO corn that was in butterfingers at the time.
Instead of changing anything, Nestlie just removed butterfingers from the
(24:29):
shelves in Germany. They're like, oh, too bad. Bites and
Many Bites debuted in two thousand and nine, and so
did Butterfinger Buzz, which were Butterfingers with caffeine that came
out around the same time.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
I don't feel like that's a good idea personally.
Speaker 1 (24:50):
I don't.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
No, it is a very voice communicated.
Speaker 1 (24:55):
How I feel.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
About it is a very two thousand and nine thing.
So yeah, yes, for sure. In twenty eleven, the brand
did this marketing campaign called the Butterfinger Defense League, which
I do not recall this, but y'all let me know.
So this marketing campaign teamed up television crime fighter personalities
(25:25):
Eric Estrada lou f for Rigno and Charisma Carpenter, you
know from like Chips and The Incredible Hulk and Buffy.
Speaker 1 (25:35):
Oh okay, yeah, no, I don't remember that at all.
Speaker 2 (25:39):
Nope, Nope, me neither. Apparently it was a thing that happened.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
They really did. The marketing of Butterfingers could just be
its own thing. We aren't even talking about all of them.
Speaker 2 (25:56):
We're breezing through, but that one was specific enough that
I really wanted to know.
Speaker 1 (26:03):
Yeah, as is this one? Oh good? When everyone was
talking about the end of the World and the mind calendar.
In twenty twelve, Butterfingers responded with an ad campaign they
labeled Barmageddon. It apparently involved a QR code, tales of
(26:26):
missing butterfingers, and they put up a crop circle in Manhattan, Kansas.
Speaker 2 (26:32):
Okay uh.
Speaker 1 (26:34):
A Butterfinger spokesperson said at the time, it's no coincidence
that a mysterious crop circle appeared on the same day
that Butterfinger bars disappeared from Moscow to Manhattan. Get your
butterfinger bars now, as there's little time left. Barmageddon is
officially here. Exclamation point wow. The company also ran a
(27:00):
Facebook contest for five thousand dollars for anyone who could
connect Butterfingers, Aliens and the Mayans.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
Oh my goodness.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
Again listeners, right I miss I missed this one too.
Speaker 2 (27:15):
Yep, yep, me too. The uh well, yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:23):
They were.
Speaker 2 (27:23):
They were big on social media in like those relatively
early social media days.
Speaker 1 (27:30):
Yeah they were. They were trying things.
Speaker 2 (27:35):
They were, they were trying many things.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
In twenty eighteen, Neslei sold Butterfingers and there are other
candies to Ferrero Spa for two point eight billion dollars.
Speaker 2 (27:52):
Yeah. Yeah, Neslie sold their entire confectionery line off to
Ferrero control of butterfingers specifically, and a lot of them.
I think I went to this Chicago based company that
Ferrero had bought a couple of years previously called Ferreira,
no relation, but the acquisition more than doubled Ferreira's business
(28:16):
portfolio just a you know, even more candy making in Chicago.
Speaker 1 (28:22):
Wild. I just feel that they are trying to purposely
confuse as poor food podcasters. It's Ferrero, and for I
don't like that at all. That's all I'm going to say.
Speaker 2 (28:32):
There was a great Chicago Tribune article that really laid
it out for me, and thank you to them because
I was a little lost and they were like, no, no, no,
I see you Lord and Vogel Bomb.
Speaker 1 (28:47):
It is confusing. In fact, Oh well, this brings us
to some drama because that is also the year that
the recipe changed, which you know, if you've been listening
to the show, people have opinions about that. They have
really strong opinions about it.
Speaker 2 (29:08):
Yeah. Okay, so this was Ferrero's Better Butterfinger campaign. They
were trying to improve what was, according to them, a
recipe that had deteriorated. In quality over the years, leading
to lagging sales. So basically they tried to like improve
the ingredients a tad. They added more cocoa and milk
(29:31):
to the chocolate coating. They removed a couple of like
high processed ingredients. Instead of ground roasted peanuts, the wrappers
now list both peanuts and peanut flour. Not sure entirely
what that's about. They did remove molasses and corn ingredients
(29:52):
from the recipe, and they also revamped the packaging with
a brighter less orange yellow yellow and a double layer
for freshness. And people were made.
Speaker 1 (30:07):
Oh yes, furious. Furious Food and Wine called the new
butterfinger a quote elevated butterfinger experience. In twenty nineteen, the
new campaign heralding a better butterfinger was met with a
(30:28):
lot of derision from fans. A petition for bringing back
the original butterfinger garnered over seven thousand signatures. You know,
I'm sure people are still I'm sure there are still
some people to this day that are like, yeah, they
haven't let go.
Speaker 2 (30:48):
Oh no, I'm positive, I am absolutely positive. If you
are one of them, let us know.
Speaker 1 (30:54):
Yes, we want.
Speaker 2 (30:56):
To hear all about all about your good memories. But yeah, no,
I mean the Butterfinger brand is really just going for it,
especially recently. Like I think that those ice cream bars
only launched this year twenty twenty five. This spring, they
released a new flavor for the first time in a
(31:16):
very long time. It was limited edition. It was salted
Caramel Butterfinger. It had like a tan chocolatey coating and
a strip of salted caramel inside the bar. I think
based on its popularity, they did the aforementioned marshmallow Butterfinger
for fall. Also in both twenty twenty four and twenty
(31:39):
twenty five, they've partnered with Heidi Klum to like trick
out her Halloween party with branded treats. And I didn't
mean for that to be a whole pun sentence, but
I just I just write these things without realizing it,
and then I'm not going to change it. No, that'd
be silly, it would anyway. Klume is like big into Halloween.
(32:02):
She's had really spectacular costumes and has been holding big parties.
This is like the twenty fourth year of her holding
really big Halloween parties apparently. And yeah, yeah, Butterfinger partnered
with her to have Butterfingers there, And I don't know,
they're doing like a Butterfinger teeny cocktail with peanut butter
(32:23):
whiskey and notes of butterscotch and chocolate. So yeah, oh okay, yeah,
yeah sounds nice.
Speaker 1 (32:36):
I'm sure.
Speaker 2 (32:37):
I'm sure that for someone who would be into that,
it's great. I hope that it finds it's intended recipient. Yeah, huh, yeah, okay,
And so a thing that I didn't mention earlier, but
I kind of meant to work in here and the
caramel thing reminded me. I'm pretty sure that at some
point in the early to mid days of the butter
(33:00):
Finger Bar there was a bit of caramel in the bar,
but I'm not sure where and how, and I couldn't
I couldn't really figure it out.
Speaker 1 (33:13):
Yeah, I have to say this was kind of a
surprising episode in terms of that where a lot of
times when we do a product or a company, they
have so many resources because they're telling their company story,
whether or not that's true not, but there's a lot
(33:36):
of stuff you can find. Yeah, Yeah, like this one
was a little a little sparse, Yeah, what I could find.
Speaker 2 (33:43):
Yeah, And I'm wondering, I'm wondering if it's that like
rapid fire exchange of company assets during that like one
really short period where maybe a bunch of stuff did
kind of get lost. Yeah, but yeah, right, because then
I was arguing with myself like was there a layer
of caramel or were they talking about like the toffee
as a caramel. You know, I don't, I don't have
(34:04):
to know.
Speaker 1 (34:06):
But here we are, here, we are, We've we've done
all five of my candies. Yeah, I feel good.
Speaker 2 (34:17):
Yeah. I got to mention Eric Castrada loop for Rick
knowing Charisma Carpenter in the same sentence.
Speaker 1 (34:25):
Yeah, that's pretty excellent. And again, we didn't even get
into all of their ad campaigns. They are they have
done some stuff. Yeah, if you want to look it up,
the ad campaign part, you can find a lot.
Speaker 2 (34:45):
Of information, certainly.
Speaker 1 (34:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (34:48):
Yeah, I mean, if if you guys really want us
to just recite ad slogans, I guess we could. But
watching the but watching watching the commercials is probably worth
your time if that's the kind of nostalgia that you're into,
because they are wacky.
Speaker 1 (35:05):
Yeah, and I did read that this was a big
nostalgia candy. So I'm curious because I personally, I feel
like there's my Dad's candy like whoppers. That's not bad,
but that's a very like hymn candy. And now I'm
wondering if I'm entering the oh do young people eat
(35:26):
butter fingers? Is it? Am? I?
Speaker 2 (35:29):
Are you the old person now?
Speaker 1 (35:33):
Yeah? So younger younger listeners right in?
Speaker 2 (35:36):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (35:36):
What am I going through?
Speaker 2 (35:38):
Yeah? True and truly the scariest part about Halloween?
Speaker 1 (35:43):
That's right, that's right, But I at least have a
butter finger to get me through.
Speaker 2 (35:48):
Well, that's good. I'm really glad.
Speaker 1 (35:50):
Mm hmm. Well, I guess that's what we have to
say about butterfingers for now. It is. Oh.
Speaker 2 (35:56):
We would indeed love to hear from y all, though,
and we do already have some listener mouth for you,
which we will get into as soon as we get
back from one more quick break for a word from
our sponsors.
Speaker 1 (36:16):
And we're back.
Speaker 2 (36:16):
Thank you, sponsor, Yes, thank you, And we're back with this.
Speaker 1 (36:40):
Yeah, it's hard to communicate those kind of things, but
I think you did a good.
Speaker 2 (36:43):
Job as I just tried to follow along with you,
and I think it worked. Maybe Andrew is helping us.
Speaker 1 (36:52):
Out always he always is. Okay, so we got a
follow up email from Haley, who is our cookie experiment tress.
That's a lot of things, and we recently read Haley's
email on here and here is a follow up another
(37:16):
double whammy. I was just listening to the provolone episode
and thinking about how I could put some in a
cookie for a cheese pull. Then provel was mentioned. I'm
originally from Missouri and spent a few years living in
Saint Louis. Provel is widely used there, specifically at a
pizza chain called Emaos. I miss that salty, creamy, ultra
(37:39):
processed nonsense every day, but it is, as are most things,
very divisive. I was writing that response in my head
when suddenly my last email was being read. I think
I've become a little numbed by all the weird things
I've eaten, because, yeah, that sentence was completely bonker. Lol.
(38:02):
Some Internet people have been downright mean about my opinion, surprise, surprise.
But I've learned a lot and get to eat cookies
every day for work and for the chair on top.
My mom is a picture framer, so I'll absolutely have
her memorialize that quote for me. Much love and big
cookie dreams. That's so funny. That's excellent. That's excellent. So
(38:28):
if you missed that listener mail, it was basically about putting.
It was the most funny, calm, strange sentence I've ever read.
That was just like, yeah, there were peppers in there,
and it was okay, but it was also mushy and
very unremarkable. And I think I'm very glad that you're
(38:50):
getting it framed. I think you should.
Speaker 2 (38:52):
Yeah, oh, absolutely, it is. It is a thing of
strange beauty.
Speaker 1 (38:57):
It is, it is, and as your work sounds like
it is. Yeah, I would love to hear if you
put profila and a cookie or provolone.
Speaker 2 (39:13):
Yeah, yeah, if you're getting a cheese pull out of
a cookie.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
I am fascinated by this, definitely, definitely. We always love
hearing about your cookie combinations. But I, like I said
in that episode, I desperately want to talk about it
because I've never heard of it, and people yeah yeah,
(39:38):
out of the gate immediately had strong opinions, and I
just really I want to know more. So let us know.
We love hearing updates about your cookies. Yeah, if you
do get that quote framed, please send us a picture.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
Yes, yes, yes, yes, oh man, oh yeah, I want
to learn more about pravel too anyway, okay U William wrote,
during October of twenty twenty four, my wife and I
visited our daughter and son in law in Japan. Spent
the month eating great food. In Japan and South Korea.
The Japanese love Halloween. Every store has an elaborate display.
(40:20):
The attached photo shows, however, that, like the logos on
many T shirts, some meaning gets jumbled in translation. This
was taken in the lobby of a small hotel we
stayed at in rural Japan. Note it's a Christmas tree
adorned with a witch's hat on top, with pumpkins and
ghosts adorning the branches. Thought it might make you smile,
(40:44):
And yes, yep, that is absolutely a Christmas tree. It
is like a green Christmas tree with white fake snow
on it, and it is decorated like a Halloween tree. Yes,
but there it's all like orange, purple and white in theme.
Speaker 1 (41:03):
I have never thought of putting a witch's hat on
top of a Christmas tree. Why now I'm very angry
at my right because that looks excellent.
Speaker 2 (41:13):
I mean because it's one of those you know, pointy
triangular like cone shaped hats with the wide rim on
the bottom and it just fits the shape of the tree.
It's also at like this very specific, slight jaunty angle
that I think is really adding something.
Speaker 1 (41:30):
I agree. I think it's really cute, it's beautiful. It
did bring us f out to my face, so thank you.
I won't go into it too much now, but I
have talked before about when I was in Japan, they
do how they do hallowing up. They have all of
these food promotions, people dress up, but it felt much
(41:53):
more and people from Japan please write in because I
was a tourist there, but it felt much more like
it was like, look at this strange thing Americans do.
Let us also do it. But it was cool. I mean,
they just had so many Being in Japan during Halloween,
I was so glad that that was the time I went.
(42:15):
It was just.
Speaker 2 (42:16):
Really cool, especially being a Halloween person as you are.
Speaker 1 (42:20):
Yeah exactly, yeah exactly. I went to a couple of
hunted houses. Yeah, so many, like very We've talked about
it before on the show, but just they go all
out on the kind of Halloween promotion with food. So
I had a lot of like Halloween foods. But it
was cool and I would love to hear from other
(42:45):
listeners about it, about what you have seen, what you
have done. Oh yeah, yeah, what's going on?
Speaker 2 (42:52):
Yeah from anywhere? Yeah, not only Japan. Right, because although
if you are listening to this on the day it
comes out, I believe it's Halloween, I can't tell the future.
But so that means that you know very soon the
Halloween season is hypothetically over for the year. But as
we've said before, the holiday lives in our hearts. So yes,
(43:15):
so feel free to write in.
Speaker 1 (43:18):
Yes, absolutely, do not let those constraints stop you, because
we love it anytime. Thank you so much to both
of those listeners for writing in. If you would like
to write to us, you can Our email is hello
at saborpod dot com.
Speaker 2 (43:34):
We're also on social media. You can find us on
Instagram and blue Sky at saber pod, and we do
hope to hear from you. Savor is production of iHeartRadio.
For more podcasts my Heart Radio, you can visit the
iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your
favorite shows. Thanks us always to our super producers Dylan
Fagan and Andrew Howard. Thanks to you for listening, and
(43:55):
we hope that lots more good things are coming your way.
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Hosts And Creators
Anney Reese
Lauren Vogelbaum
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