Yowie Yummies!
Hey, bigfooters! For today's Sasquatch BOOtacular blog post, I'm going to talk about the Yowie candy comapny in Austrailia. Now, if any of you people out there are giving this candy out on Halloween, a big thumbs up to you! Now, on to the candy's history:
The History of Yowie (The Candy Company)
Yowie is a confectionery and publishing brand originating in Australia. It was one of the top selling chocolates in Australia in the late 1990s and early 2000s, selling over a million units a week. After a break of nearly a decade, Yowie returned to the retail market in 2014.
Yowie began as the brainchild of English-born advertising man, illustrator and author Geoff Pike. After serving in the navy, Pike jumped ship in Australia, finding work as a jackaroo on remote cattle stations. He became enchanted by Australia’s outback and its unique wildlife, and devoted his free time to nursing injured and orphaned animals back to health.
Many decades later, after a successful career in advertising, Pike drew on these early bush experiences and his love of wild places to create the Yowie Kingdom, a fictional magical realm free of the destructive influence of humanity, where threatened wildlife finds a safe haven.
Inspired by Australian folklore, Pike borrowed the legendary human-like creature the Yowie, reputed to roam the Australian bush. To watch over the fictional Yowie Kingdom and its animals and plants, Pike created six Yowie characters, each related to a well-known Australian animal, and each one guardian of key wild habitats:
Boof the Bottlebrush Yowie, cousin of the bandicoot, protector of rainforests and mountains
Crag the Mangrove Yowie: cousin of the crocodile, protector of swamps and wetlands
Ditty the Lillipilli Yowie: cousin of the wombat, protector of woodlands and meadows
Nap the Honeygum Yowie: cousin of the koala, protector of forests and bushland
Rumble the Redgum Yowie: cousin of the red kangaroo, protector of deserts and plains
Squish the Fiddlewood Yowie: cousin of the platypus, protector of rivers and streams
Additional characters included animal companions for each of the six Yowie and Balthizar the Bunyip, ruler of the Yowie Kingdom. To represent the threats facing the world’s natural habitats and threatened species, Pike created the Grumkin, careless creatures constantly seeking to destroy the harmony of the Yowie Kingdom. The Grumkins were: Munch (careless building, enemy of Rumble), Blob (pollution, enemy of Crag), Ooz (also pollution, enemy of Squish), Spark (careless firelighting, enemy of Nap), Slob (littering, enemy of Ditty) and Chomp the Tiger Toothed Tree Chomper (deforestation, enemy of Boof).
Continuing with the development of the Yowie concept and characters, Pike enlisted the aid of long-time friend, fellow advertising man and best-selling author Bryce Courtenay. They hit upon the idea of a confectionery product as a vehicle for Yowie, and in 1994 pitched the concept to confectionery giant Cadbury.
After three years developing the characters and the manufacturing process, in 1997 Cadbury launched Yowie as a foil-wrapped character-shaped milk chocolate shell containing a plastic capsule. Within the capsule was a multi-part collectable model of a native Australian or New Zealand animal, together with a leaflet featuring information, a photo of the animal and assembly instructions for the collectable. The first series featured 50 animals, plus figurines of each of the six Yowie characters.[2]
Cadbury Yowie was selling over one million units weekly and in its first year sold 2.5 Yowies for every man, woman and child in Australia.[3] The brand won multiple industry awards in Australia and internationally, including Best Global Supermarket Product and Best Global Confectionery Product at the 1997 Sial international food industry awards in Paris.[citation needed]
A Yowie collector scene soon emerged with collector clubs forming across Australia and New Zealand and websites devoted to displaying and swapping Yowie collectables.
Cadbury Yowie was also released in Singapore, Japan and the UK.
How interesting is that? Yowie chocolate! I hope you enjoyed this blog post, and I will see you soon, bigfooters! Keep eating candy! (: (All info. from Wikipedia)
