On 13 Nov 2003 10:46:00 -0600
Richard Kaszeta > wrote:

> (Chris) writes:
> > The result is packaging that is very hard to open, a poor tasting
> > chocolate, and the loss of a fine American tradition.
>
> I'm not sure that plastic will have much effect on the taste of
> Hershey's---it's just not all that good a chocolate...
>
> But it does remind me of when they moved Reese's Peanut Butter Cups
> (hey, we all eat junk food on occasion...) to plastic wrappers---to
> me, the quality went downhill, because I discovered that I actually
> liked Reese's better when it was slightly stale (the peanut butter
> would harden up), and the new packaging kept it entirely too fresh.


Oddly enough, my brother's wife used to live within walking distance of
a factory that cranked out Reese's peanut butter cups. She'd
occasionally walk down there and buy factory seconds -- mistakes in
packaging, usually. Anyway, the point is, when she moved away, she
discovered that she didn't like them if they weren't fresh off the
factory line.

Takes all kinds. But a drop in the quality of a hershey bar . . . you
couldn't break an egg dropping it that distance. At any rate, big
multimilliondollar companies put a lot of stock in consistency.

When Frito Lay announced that they were going to switch from
hydrogenated vegetable shortening to corn oil for all their frying
operations, there was a space of about four months there where doritos
just weren't right. Some bags were oily, some bags were dry but lacked
flavor, some bags were caked with seasonings. One of the bigger mistakes
they've made has to have been switching right to corn oil without
running it by their obviously extremely talented food scientists first
to come up with documentation for a new production process, since it was
obvious to anyone with a weakness for their carefully calculated chips
that it was taking a while for the workers to get the hang of it.

Hershey probably thinks this plastic packaging will improve the quality
of the end product. It will probably give it a longer shelf life and
less of a propensity to absorb flavors from it's environment. If there
is a quality drop due to issues with the actual packaging process or
materials used, I'm sure they'll iron it out eventually.

And i have no sympathy for anyone who does not respect the sanctity of
foil wrapped chocolate anyhow. Paper indeed.

But like i said, their mint flavored and cookies & cream bars were
always in plastic. I don't even recall if they make those anymore. They
always seemed reasonably easy to open and as tasty as could be expected,
until i developed a sensitivity to some sort of secondary compound or
solvent residue or other impurity in low quality synthesized vanilla and
mint flavorings, which keeps me off cheap chocolate almost entirely. A
really cheap bowl of mint chocolate chip icecream gives me the world's
worst heartburn these days.

- Eric