I’ve often stated that one of my favorite things to uncover and learn about are the little-known extensions and flavor spinoffs from the well-known candy brands we love. Today, I get to reveal a pair of them that you almost certainly have never heard of before. From the 1970’s comes a previously unknown member of the fruit-flavored Duds family: Orange Duds. And from a decade ago, it’s the most unusual Fun Dip flavor you’ve ever seen: Sweet & Spicy Mango with Chili Fun Dip!
As regular readers of this site may know, I’ve spent years tracking down information and packaging examples from the 1970’s fruit-flavored Duds line. I wrote up everything I’d learned about Holloway’s fruit-flavored Duds back in December 2012, and for a long time since then I’d not found any new scraps of information. But today I get to unveil the news of a flavor that was only rumored to exist – let’s take a look at Holloway’s Orange Duds!
Beatrice – Holloway – Orange Duds – Milk Duds – 1 1/4 oz candy box – 1977
HAPPY APRIL FOOL’S DAY!!!!
Did I get anyone?
By now, you’ve realized that today’s column is all about having a little fun and celebrating the tradition of April Fool’s Day. This is a bit of a follow-up to last year when I tried the same trick of introducing never-before-seen flavors of existing brands. Last year I took aim at Willy Wonka’s Oompas and Hot Tamales along with my childhood favorite, the Marathon bar.
For today’s post, I set about to create a flavor of fruit-flavored Duds I’d never seen before, and came up with Orange Duds. I based the look of the box off of the actual Cherry Duds box in my collection. A few hours of Photoshop trickery and I turned Cherry into Orange. Here’s a look at the actual Cherry Duds box next to the imaginary Orange Duds box I created from it:
Cherry Duds real original box to Orange Duds April Fool’s faux box – side by side image
At this point you would probably assume that Orange Duds are purely the product of my imagination, but it might just be possible that a real Orange Duds existed back in the 1970’s – we just don’t know. Holloway’s fruit-flavored Duds line is one that is shrouded in quite a bit of mystery and I’ve heard hazy recollections of people who remember more flavors than what we know definitively to exist. Those confirmed-to-have-existed flavors being Grape, Cherry, Banana and Strawberry Duds.
So a real Orange Duds candy might possibly have existed and a box for them may be out there somewhere waiting to be discovered, but what I showed you today is not it. It would be awfully exciting to turn up a real Orange Duds box, or any other fruit-flavored Duds box that isn’t currently known about. For now, all we have is flavorful speculation.
What about that crazy Sweet & Spicy Mango with Chili Fun Dip? Well, that one is actually half-real – here’s a closer look:
Nestle – Wonka – Lik-m-Aid Fun Dip Sweet & Spicy Mango with Chili – candy packaging concept artwork – circa 2003
Back in 2003, Nestle-Wonka actually considered producing a Mango with Chili flavored Fun Dip (and Nerds, too) for regional markets, but to the best of my knowledge they never made it past the concept stage. The artwork seen here today was one of the actual internal packaging concepts generated during that time and came from the discarded files of an ex Wonka employee (probably a retired Oompa Loompa).
So even though Mango with Chili Fun Dip never made it to market, isn’t it amazing to see? I can’t say if a sweet and spicy Fun Dip would have sold very well, but I’m dying to try it! What do you think?
I hope you’ve enjoyed today’s tricky post and our special look back at a never-before-seen Wonka product that almost was.
And that’s everything for this year’s April Fool’s Day entry . See you next time!!
Glad this is real and not April Fools!
Wow, that Fun Dip is pretty incredible! It’s fun to see concept samples of products that never quite made it to market for some reason.
It is interesting to note that Wonka would later make a Mango product that actually made it to store shelves. In 2007, they added Mango and Pineapple flavors to Runts candies. The flavor choices, along with Spanish words added to the packaging, were made to appeal to the Spanish speaking market. But those flavors were gone by the next year.