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Mars Gets Explicit In Marketing Fling

Mars is introducing its first new chocolate bar in more than 20 years and it's in "super girly packaging - it's shiny and it's pink and the chocolate even sparkles a little bit." What's more, the Fling is "sexual, uninhibited [and] only 85 calories."

Lisa Johnson, the co-author of Don't Think Pink: What Really Makes Women Buy - and How to Increase Your Share of This Crucial Market, hasn't tasted the product yet, which is in test markets in California. But she does takes a good bite out of the marketing, which she calls a "full-frontal attack," "weird" and "creepy."

"The language of it has so much sexual innuendo, you could pack it into a trashy novel," says Johnson, who feels Mars is taking the connection women often make between chocolate and sensuality too literally. Mars spokesman Ryan Bowling, however, says the ads that invite you to "Pleasure yourself" in pink lettering have been otherwise well received so far.

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Read the whole story at NPR’s “All Things Considered” »

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