A sweet-toothed fan of a discontinued chocolate bar has gathered nearly 5,000 followers to sign his petition to force the manufacturer to have a change of heart and reintroduce his favourite snack.
Milky Way Crispy Rolls may be gone but they are not forgotten by Jack Taylor, who is hoping his call to action will halt manufacturer Mars Wrigley UK's extinction plans for his much-loved treat.
At the last count, 4,864 people had signed his petition, and Jack is convinced he will reach 5,000 in the next few days, much to his delight. "When you think about it that many signatures already for just a Milky Way Crispy Roll is pretty impressive," he said.
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Jack's suspicions grew that plans were afoot to cull his favourite bar when they started to disappear from the shelves of stores. And his fears were confirmed when B&M, Co-Op and Poundland all told The Sun that they no longer stocked Jack's go-to snack.
"This is a product that I really enjoyed buying and I want people to sign this petition so that we can hopefully get this product in production again," said Jack. "This product has been around for quite some time and it’s disappointing that after all that time that Mars has discontinued it from its product range," he said. "I for one would rather have a Milky Way Crispy Roll rather than a Milky Way and I’m sure many other people think the same.
"I know that some products are discontinued because they are not as popular as other products, however I don’t think this is the case here. The only stores in the UK that sold this product were B&M, The Co-op and Poundland. Why wasn’t Waitrose, Morrisons, Tesco and Asda selling this product? I believe if this product was sold in those stores it would be more popular. If you went to a store that did stock that product you would mostly find it out of stock because of demand."
His petition has struck a chord with fans of the elusive treat, with one petition signatory saying: "Crispy Roll are better than any other Mars product by far" and another asking "Why Oh Why take these off our shelves? They are so tasty. Don't do it."
The chocolate bar, which is made up of crunchy biscuit coated in Mars' signature Milky Way cream and covered in milk chocolate, was first launched in Germany in 1994.
A spokesperson for Mars Wrigley UK said: "While Milky Way Crispy Rolls are currently in a galaxy far, far away we’re pleased to offer many delicious alternatives such as Milky Way Magic Stars, Maltesers, Mars and of course, the traditional Milky Way. The love for Milky Way Crispy Rolls has been out of this world and we’ve certainly taken note!”
Milky Way Crispy Rolls is the latest chocolate bar to join the supermarket aisle in the sky, but how many of these can you remember?
1. Cadbury Time Out: Fans were furious Cadbury pulled the dual fingered Time Out bar in favour for the Time Out Wafer in March 2016. Apparently, 71 per cent of Brits prefer the old school double finger Time Out.
2. Dairy Milk Tasters: They looked a little bit like Maltesers, but bite into one and you'd find a solid ball of old-style proper Cadbury's chocolate. They weren't popular enough and were discontinued when American food producers Kraft bought Cadbury in 2010.
3. Cadbury Fuse: Cadbury stopped production on the chocolate, nut, raisin, cereal and fudge bar in 2006 and briefly brought it back for a Halloween competition back in 2015.
4. Mars Delight: It rarely works when 'lighter' versions of classics are launched, and here we have Exhibit A, the lighter version of the classic Mars bar. This disappeared from shelves in 2008, only four years after it was launched.
5. KitKat Senses: Exhibit B, the light version of the KitKat, which was equally short-lived. Even the ad campaign with Girls Aloud couldn't save it
6. Cadbury Dream: A white chocolate version of the Dairy Milk bar, what's not to like? Quite a lot apparently, because they were discontinued after an ill-fated rebrand as Cadbury White. Strangely, chocolate fans in Australia and New Zealand love them - it's one of the top five block chocolate brands.
7. Kitkat Caramac: What could go wrong when a hybrid of Kitkat and Caramac hit the shelves in 2005? People didn't like it, that's what, and it was binned just two years later.
8. Cadbury Wispa Mint: Launched to rival Rowntree's (now Nestle's) Aero Mint bars in 1995, these were pulled from shelves in 2003 because they were no longer popular enough
9. Cadbury Taz: Caramel-filled Cadbury's Freddos used to be known as Taz bars and featured the Loony Tunes character, Taz the Tasmanian devil. They were pulled from shelves for a few years before being relaunched with the Freddo character on the packaging in 1994.
10. The Mars Applause: This mix of nuts, raisins, dried apple, caramel and biscuit sounds more like a health bar than a chocolate bar, which is maybe why it didn't make it into the new millennium.
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