Disturbing reason popular Celebrations chocolates pulled from Aussie stores

In absolutely devastating news, Mars has decided to discontinue Celebrations chocolate, and given the Christmas countdown is on, there's never been a worse time. After all, what is Christmas without a box of Celebrations on the table? Not very celebratory.

While Aussies have been left mourning the mini chocs as they're wiped from Woolworths, Coles, Kmart, and Big W shelves, it's not the first time in recent years we've had to bid farewell to some sweet treats. The last few years has seen the discontinuation of numerous childhood faves — from Starburst to Allens' Fantales — and Professor Gary Mortimer, a researcher in the areas of food retailing, retail marketing and consumer behaviour at QUT, tells Yahoo Lifestyle shoppers shouldn't be that surprised.

"If we look back over the last few years we’ve seen other types of confectionery and biscuits discontinue on our shelves," he said, citing the rising complexities around the costs of producing. "Unfortunately with any food product, be it confectionery or biscuits, if there is no great demand for the product or the input costs become non-economical, then ultimately brands will consider deleting it or suspending production for a period of time."

What happened to Mars' Celebrations?

Indeed, a Mars spokesperson told 2GB that importing the chocolates was the reason they had been cut from our Aussie shelves.

“Our Celebrations products are imported from Europe and like many Australian businesses importing products from overseas, we’re experiencing rising cost pressures and supply challenges,” a Mars spokesman said. “We’ve made the difficult decision to discontinue Celebrations in Australia.”

Gary told Yahoo Lifestyle the rising cost of cocoa, plus the product being manufactured in Europe, would've added to the decision.

“Obviously there's the cost of production and logistics in shipping costs, [but] the commodity price of cocoa has gone up from around $2000USD ($3,093 AUD) per tonne in 2020, to now over $8000USD ($12,372 AUD) per tonne. Those commodity prices have had an impact on retail prices at the other end, and obviously Mars has made the decision it cannot deliver those products."

The assorted chocolates have been available in Australia since 1997 and have been a firm favourite (no rival pun intended) of many Aussie families as they celebrated birthdays, Christmas, Easter... anything. The whole point of the chocolates is in the name after all.

All hope may not be forever lost though, with the spokesperson also saying there may be a chance Celebrations can be reintroduced in the future.

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“We know Celebrations is a much-loved brand, so we’re currently reviewing options to reintroduce Celebrations in 2025,” they said.

Gary told Yahoo Lifestyle that the company could be looking at an 'alternative' place to manufacture or could change the packaging or weight of the product, leading to shrinkflation. "There are different ways manufacturers will try and maintain continuity in the market, so we may see it come back in 2025 or 2026 possibly in a different form or from a different country," Gary said.

Aussies react to discontinuation of Celebrations

After the news broke, there was a mixed reaction from Aussies, with some mourning the loss (aka me, clearly) and others really not fussed.

"Did the tin size just keep getting smaller til it vanished?" one person joked. "With this so-called 'financial crisis' people won't be able to afford them anyway," another said.

"That's a hate crime to Australian families," someone else commented, while another begged, "Please bring them back."

"Celebrations have always been better than Favourites as there isn't a dud in the box......boo!" said someone after my own heart.

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Some people weren't sad about the news. "Crap chocolate anyway," someone said. "They taste kinda funky, wasn’t a fan of them…" another agreed.

"They weren't that great anyway! Tasted so different to the full size bars. Cadbury Favourites are soooo much better," someone else (a liar) commented.

Well, we can all agree to disagree, but I'll miss you, Celebrations.

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