These Chocolates Might Explode in Your Hand

Brandweek,  Feb 21, 2000  by Mike Beirne

• E-mail
• Print
• Link

True Confections doesn't sell candy as much as it peddles humor and laughs via splashy package graphics. And rather than pursue space on crowded candy shelves, it finds licenses that appeal to niche consumers and goes where those folks are likely to hang out.

So Lady Death, a white chocolate bar named after Chaos Comics' lingerie clad descendant of a fallen angel, is sold at comic book outlets right next to vampire babe bars Chastity and Purgatori. Sweet Betty's Boop-A-Doop bars lounge in the checkout lanes of Bed, Bath and Beyond.

Then there are Homicidal Lesbian Terrorist Booster Bars, based on cartoonist Diane Dimassa's Hothead Paisan's strip, available at, well you figure it out. Coming soon to golf courses and sporting goods outlets: Bogey bars, and to hardware shops, the Handyman Bar--a candy-filled toolbox with Fit-it-Guy, a do-it-yourself type banging his thumb with a hammer. "We're really selling a box and wrappers that talk to the marketplace and communicate the license of that message in a way so consumers get it," said Don Todrin, the self-described "grand wazoo" of the Amherst, Mass.-based firm.

Two bucks might be steep for low-grade chocolate, but True is selling impulse items that can double as gifts. Todrin adds that Mars, Hershey and Nestle would turn green with envy at his margins. True's top-seller is a Scooby-Doo bar. Up next: Lara Croft's Tomb Raider and Buffy the Vampire Slayer bars. Grrrr.

Program: True Confections licensed candy

Marketer: True Confections, Amherst, Mass.

Agencies: In house

Key Players: Don Todrin, grand wazoo; James Whitmer, archvillian-licensing and marketing; Adrienne Vrettos, wicked apprentice; Tom Martin, artist; Kevin Johnston, assoc artist

COPYRIGHT 2000 Nielsen Business Media, Inc.
COPYRIGHT 2008 Gale, Cengage Learning