Beich’s Halloween Laffy Taffy of the early 1990’s!

Back during the late 1980’s and early 1990’s, the Beich’s candy company was going through some rapid corporate transformations, but along the way they played around with Halloween seasonal releases of their most enduring product; Laffy Taffy.   Make the jump to check it out!

Right around 1990, the Beich’s candy company would be acquired by Sunmark/Concorde Brands, which was also becoming a part of Nestle at the time.   This would eventually lead to things like Beich’s Laffy Taffy enveloping Sunmark’s Tangy Taffy – with Tangy Taffy surviving but taking on the Laffy Taffy brand name, among other things.  It’s a more complicated bit of confectionery history than I want to get into today, but needless to say, the folks at Beich’s continued to work on creating fun seasonal variations of their products through those rapidly changing times.  That is certainly true where their Halloween seasonal product was concerned.

Several of the pieces I have to share today came to me by way of a design contractor who worked with Sunmark, and while they have the appearance of a final product, they might have actually been pre-release mockups of some sort.  The only hint that some of these aren’t final production releases is that they lack UPC codes on the packs.   I’m going with the assumption that these did eventually make it into retail circulation, but you never know, these might not have ever been distributed.

In 1992, Beich’s Laffy Taffy packaging featured an arched logo style which can be seen in the following multi-pack 7oz bag:

Concorde Brands – Laffy Taffy Assorted – 7oz multi-pack candy package – 1992

I have a Halloween-themed package sample that clearly mirrors the design and look of that 1992 pack, replacing the banana mascot with that of a ghost.  Even the flavor assortment of the Halloween release remains the same as the standard; Strawberry, Sour Apple, Sour Grape, and Banana.  Check it out:

Nestle-Beich – Halloween Laffy Taffy – Assorted – 7oz mult-pack candy package – ?prototype? – early 1990’s

I  have a remarkably similar Halloween design package from this era that sports a number of notable differences.  First, the package sports a horizontally straight Laffy Taffy logo rather than the previously-used arched version.  It also features more than just the ghost character, as it includes a masked version of the Sour Apple mascot found on standard Laffy Taffy packaging in 1993.  Like the previous package example, this one also lacks a UPC code, making it a possible pre-release prototype or mock-up:

Nestle-Beich – Halloween Laffy Taffy – Assorted – 10oz mult-pack candy package – ?prototype? – 1993

Here’s a standard all-year-round Laffy Taffy multi-pack from 1993 that features the same Sour Apple mascot as part of a diverse group that includes the Banana character from the 1992 packaging:

Concorde Brands – Laffy Taffy Assorted – 7oz multi-pack candy package – 1993

All in all, today’s write-up doesn’t contain a lot of hard hitting confectionery history, but I’m hoping that it serves as an entertaining glimpse as well as a historical marker.  With more research and luck, I plan to eventually return to Laffy Taffy to assemble a clearer picture of this brand and its complete evolution.

And that’s everything I’ve got for today’s post on Beich’s Halloween Laffy Taffy of the early 1990’s.  See you next time!

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