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M and Ms Facts

M and Ms Facts
M&M's are button-shaped candy with a chocolate or chocolate and peanut center. M&M's were introduced in 1941 in the United States after the son of Mars Company's founder saw soldiers in the Spanish Civil War eating Smarties. Mars went on to secure its own patent on the manufacturing process and release M&M's. The two M's are meant to represent Bruce Murrie (Hershey Chocolate's founder's son) and Forrest Mars Sr. (Newark Company's founder). During World War II there was a big demand for M&M's and the company expanded. M&M's were sold only to the military during WWII. Peanut M&M's were introduced in 1954.
Interesting M and Ms Facts:
It was a toss-up between M&M's and Reese's to be used in the blockbuster movie E.T. but Reese's ended up being the choice and it is believed to have increased sales by 300%.
Until 1954 the M on M&M's was printed in black ink. After 1954 it was printed in white. Prior to 1950 there was no M printed on M&M's.
In 1954 the slogan "The milk chocolate that melts in your mouth, not in your hand" was trademarked, along with the M&M characters.
The NASA space program participants prefer M&M's over most other chocolate.
It wasn't until 1972 that the M&M characters began to appear on packaging for the candies.
The Go Go boots for Green M&M were chosen to hide her unattractive ankles from earlier drawings.
Red, Blue, and Yellow M&M characters where introduced in 1995.
Ms. Brown M&M's voice is done by Vanessa Williams, and she was introduced in 2012.
M&M's are manufactured in Tennessee and in New Jersey.
M&M's were only introduced to the international market in the 1980s.
Every day more than 400 million M&M's are manufactured.
NASCAR made M&M's their official chocolate in 2006.
M&M's are a sponsor of the National Football League.
M&M's often releases special holiday packaging versions of the chocolates and includes a variety of fillings and sizes.
BOO-terscotch was an M&M flavor released for Halloween.
Crispy M&M's were released as a limited edition in 1998 but were so well received that they became a regular M&M's variety.
When Pretzel M&M's were released in 2010 the spokescandy for the variety was Orange.
Blue M&M's only came about when a marketing campaign for the brand in 1995 asked consumers which color they would like to add to the candy. Blue was voted in.
In Hawaii, Florida, and Kansas, M&M's are the favorite Halloween candy.
Caramel M&M's are supposed to be released in 2017.
M&M's were originally packaged in a cardboard tube. The bags they are packaged in today were not introduced until 1948.
Red M&M's were removed from the group in the 1970s because of a study that linked the red food color to cancer. Red was reintroduced in the mid-1980s.
Van Halen, the rock band, always requested that the brown M&M's had to be removed. Although seen as being juvenile, the band saw this as a test to a venue's ability to provide enough security for them. If not removed they would cancel.


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