Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments

DJWGibson t1_j6ap9em wrote

It seems stupid, but if one store was, say, selling a Cadbury's chocolate bar that contained chocolate and another store was selling a similarly shaped bar with similar wrapping and the same branding but which contained a brown coloured edible oil product you'd feel cheated, even if the small print of the package clearly said "candy bar with chocolate flavour."

This is why brands have trademarks. You expect one thing when you buy a product.

It's basically a company making a knockoff version of their own product...

123

usagizero t1_j6d5wrl wrote

>a Cadbury's chocolate bar

You are closer than you think with your analogy. "there are minimum standards for chocolate. In the UK it must contain a minimum of 30% cocoa. However, in the US it needs to only contain 10%." US chocolate is notoriously different tasting to EU chocolate, to me it tastes of paraffin, very waxy, while UK chocolate is more creamy.

Heck, cheese and butter where i live is similar, very strict about what can be called either. "Cheese food" can be seen on things not quite cheese, and it always amused me.

18

-burgers t1_j6dlfld wrote

In the us we also have a problem with ice cream. It has to contain at least 10% of milk fat, and ice cream must have no more than 100% overrun and weigh no less than 4.5 lbs. per gallon. Anything lower is labeled as a frozen dairy dessert. The frozen dairy dessert ice cream is a few dollars cheaper, and 100%+ overrun, resulting in a lot of fluff and no substance.

10

Sarah_withanH t1_j6dunmn wrote

I have to wonder if this is the same for other countries too. I recently got some Japanese branded Kit-Kats from the Asian market, and the chocolate was way, way better than American Kit-Kats.

5

usagizero t1_j6dwvjs wrote

Oh, don't get me started on Japanese Kit-Kats! lol. Not only is the chocolate better tasting, they have so many more flavors, and while some are a miss for me, some are awesome and even just having the choices is great.

6

DJWGibson t1_j6d6uxf wrote

There’s a reason I chose a UK brand for that analogy rather than Hersheys…

2

DeathLeopard t1_j6en1mk wrote

It's owned by an American company for more than a decade now. Or maybe I misunderstood and you were referring to the recipe changes after they took over.

1

DJWGibson t1_j6flcnw wrote

Cadbury is still headquarted in the UK. (In London actually.)

It's owned by Mondelez International, which started in America, but Cadbury is still a separate company and not a division or branch.

1

sealmeal21 t1_j6e93s0 wrote

Branding. That's the only thing that matters here. In the eyes of the law they don't care if you put shit in a bottle but once you brand it it's a big deal. If they wanted to do this they should have had China make it and send it over. Chiba does this with a million things already.

1

StuffinYrMuffinR t1_j6b1ssr wrote

So if you accidentally grabbed a diet coke instead of a normal coke, you think it's cokes fault you can't read?

−57

DJWGibson t1_j6b8ec8 wrote

Diet Coke, Coke, Caffeine Free Coke, and Coke Zero all have very different colour schemes on their label for that reason.

If someone tried to grab a Diet Coke or Caffeine-Free Coke and instead got a full sugar and full caffeine Coke that could be problematic for someone with diabetes or an allergy.

Selling an alcohol-free drink at alcoholic drink prices in a bottle that almost exactly look like the whiskey bottle (https://media-cldnry.s-nbcnews.com/image/upload/rockcms/2023-01/fireball2-te-230124-ca8046.jpg) feels like a scam.

52

jtoppan t1_j6bhfy6 wrote

It’s not alcohol free. It’s just half strength malt liquor, rather than whiskey.

5

NerdyToc t1_j6brw7t wrote

So you agree, it looks the exact same as the whisky bottles, but it doesn't contain whisky.

Or, to use your coke analogy, it looks identical to a coke bottle, but the ingredients say it contains aspratame instead of sugar.

21