{"id":7019,"date":"2012-10-25T11:12:30","date_gmt":"2012-10-25T15:12:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.collectingcandy.com\/wordpress\/?p=7019"},"modified":"2014-06-14T08:37:00","modified_gmt":"2014-06-14T12:37:00","slug":"the-mystery-of-willy-wonkas-halloween-ghostopper-and-more","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/collectingcandy.com\/wordpress\/?p=7019","title":{"rendered":"The Mystery of Willy Wonka’s Halloween Ghostopper and More!"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Every once in a while I come across something that blows my candy historian-and-collector mind.\u00a0 Such was the case with a trio of digital files that recently landed in my inbox; files that reveal unused designs for a series of Willy Wonka Halloween-themed products from 1997.<\/p>\n

To the best of my knowledge, these packages were never put into production and these designs have never been published anywhere before.\u00a0 Because of that, today’s post is an exciting CollectingCandy.com Halloween exclusive and world premiere!<\/p>\n

It’s not unusual for designs to be worked up and not used in the packaging industry.\u00a0 For every design you see on a store shelf, there could be dozens that were commissioned, tweaked and ultimately discarded.\u00a0\u00a0 But it’s rare for these designs to surface as they’re typically filed away and forgotten.\u00a0 That all makes today a very special treat.<\/p>\n

The Willy Wonka brand has long been producing specially packaged versions of their candy for Halloween distribution. \u00a0 Looking at today’s lost designs, it’s clear that these were developed for fun-size cello packs that would be sold as part of a larger Halloween Willy Wonka multi pack.\u00a0 You’ve already seen the Ghostopper at the top of today’s post, and now I’m going to unveil them all:<\/p>\n

This Gobstopper Ghostopper design is quite wonderful, and it’s really unfortunate that this one didn’t get made – I think it nails the concept.<\/p>\n

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Willy Wonka’s Gobstoppers – Unreleased Halloween design – Ghostopper – 1997<\/p><\/div>\n

Next up, we have a Halloween version of Runts.\u00a0 In this case, the Runts name was changed to Zombies, and the Runts’ fruit mascots are adorably thrown into Halloween garb.<\/p>\n

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Willy Wonka’s Runts – Unreleased Halloween design – Zombies – 1997<\/p><\/div>\n

Finally, we have the Halloween design for Double-Dipped Nerds, now given the name “Mutant Globs”:<\/p>\n

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Willy Wonka’s Nerds – Unreleased Halloween design – Mutant Globs – 1997<\/p><\/div>\n

The packaging design for Mutant Globs seems to mix spooky with sci-fi elements, and I dig it.<\/p>\n

It’s a shame that these fun Halloween-themed Wonka candy packages never made it past the design stage, but at least I’ve had the fortune to be able to share the fun of them here with you today.\u00a0\u00a0 It’s so rare to be able to see unused designs like this or to get a peek at a Halloween candy that almost was.\u00a0 I hope you’ve enjoyed seeing these as much as I did bringing them to you.<\/p>\n

And that’s everything for today’s post on the mystery of Willy Wonka’s Halloween Ghostopper.\u00a0 See you next time!<\/p>\n

\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s post has been part of CollectingCandy.com\u2019s Countdown to Halloween.\u00a0 To check out other sites celebrating Halloween all month long, check out the official Halloween Countdown site.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Every once in a while I come across something that blows my candy historian-and-collector mind.\u00a0 Such was the case with a trio of digital files that recently landed in my inbox; files that reveal unused designs for a series of … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[35,589,252,50,164],"tags":[321,316,328,351,332,14,324,78,333,1222,415,1216,21,15,348,165,350,11],"class_list":["post-7019","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-1990s","category-countdowntohalloween","category-halloween","category-holiday-2","category-wonka","tag-candy-collecting","tag-candy-collection","tag-candy-collector","tag-candy-wrapper-collection","tag-candy-wrapper-collector","tag-collectible","tag-collecting-candy","tag-confectionery","tag-confections","tag-halloween","tag-halloween-candy","tag-nestle","tag-packaging","tag-sweets","tag-vintage-candy-wrapper","tag-willy-wonka","tag-wonka-candy","tag-wrapper"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2aFGk-1Pd","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/collectingcandy.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7019","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/collectingcandy.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/collectingcandy.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/collectingcandy.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/collectingcandy.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7019"}],"version-history":[{"count":17,"href":"http:\/\/collectingcandy.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7019\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14515,"href":"http:\/\/collectingcandy.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7019\/revisions\/14515"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/collectingcandy.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7019"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/collectingcandy.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7019"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/collectingcandy.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7019"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}