• by Danielle Oster , Staff Writer, June 6, 2024

The rainbow is back on Skittles Pride Packs this year, but it’s unclear if you can still track them down.

This year, the traditional rainbow returned to the brand’s Pride offering for the first time in half a decade, ending the approach of “giving up its colors” for Pride Month with packs of all-gray Skittles -- which played on the ubiquity of the rainbow colors to Skittles’ branding throughout the rest of the year and highlighted its platforming of LGBTQ+ partners.

This year’s Pride Packs also departed from the company’s practice over the course of the past two years of handing over design for Pride Packs to a group of LGBTQ+ artists and designers, who contributed illustrations on top of a gray backdrop.

Over the years, Skittles’ Pride Packs design ensured they stood out from their usual packaging. This year’s design would be comparatively easy to miss due to its relative similarity to Skittles’ typical packaging.

There were similarities to previous Pride efforts as well, including centering the campaign around a brand partnership.

This year’s campaign focuses on the theme “When you find your community, your colors shine,” a message tied to its partnership with Meetup. A QR code on Skittles Pride Packs, and various campaign elements, including social media posts, direct consumers to the “Skittles LGBTQ+ Directory, powered by Meetup,” a curated list celebrating LGTBQ+ groups on the social platform. Users with further resources through the brand’s continuing partnership with The brand also pledged to donate $1 from the sale of each Pride Pack, up to $100,000, to the LGBTQ+ advocacy organization GLAAD, as it has in years past.

Skittles shipped its Pride Packs in late April, with the packs appearing on store shelves early the next month, “ensuring products were available for Pride Month,” according to the brand. But it’s unclear to what extent packs are still available in stores, in the first full week of June, or if that relates to a more limited supply compared to years prior.

The item was unavailable at four retail locations visited for this story. Last year, packs were available in stores from mid-May through mid-July, according to the brand’s release announcing their launch.

The brand didn’t respond to a request for comment on whether the product was made available on popular ecommerce channels, but it is not currently available on Amazon, or on Target or Walmart’s online channels.

Skittles declined to share detailed information about how many Pride Packs it produced this year, but did confirm it produced over 100,000 of them.

While the May release date is not out of line with recent years, the company also was more muted about its promotion of its Pride campaign than in years past, not doing so until late May. A press release announcing the news first hit the wire on May 22 – compared to May 2 and May 10 in 2023 and 2022, respectively. Marketing Daily inquired about the gap between the Pride Packs’ release and its promotion of the campaign, but has yet to receive a response.

Skittles’s Pride Packs were the target of a far-right hate campaign last August, following a post by anti-LGTBQ+ extremist Chaya Raichik stating that the brand was “trying to turn your kids into BLM and LGBTQ+ activists.” The post related to one of the designs from a Skittles partner artists that included the phrase “Black trans lives matter.” Other anti-trans influencers also took to posting about the Pride Packs, while spreading disinformation that GLAAD “[pushes] medical transition on kids,” according to reporting by the publication Them. However, Unlike Bud Light parent company ABInBev, the brand didn’t appear to capitulate to the hate campaign last summer with any statements distancing itself from its Pride Packs or artist partnerships.