Old Candy Critic Articles - The Higher the Expectations…

I've decided to take down several old articles from the candycritic.org and re-post them here on the Candy Critic blog.  This week I'm posting an article Allison wrote about the disappointment she found in an no sugar added treat.

It’s no secret that I live a low-carb lifestyle. It’s also no secret that I loooooove chocolate, so I get my chocolate kicks from various “no sugar added” sources. Of these, I have to say my favourite is Hershey’s. They make lovely little chocolatey bars – regular, dark, and regular with little bitty pieces of almonds – and mini Reese’s peanut butter cups. The PB cups are a little drier than the regular cups, but still yummy. They all come individually wrapped in bags of about a dozen.

As for the bars, my favourites are most definitely the ones with the wee almonds. I like the little crunch, and I feel good to know that I’m getting a bit of protein with my snack. Win-win situation, I think. Except for the fact that there have been repeated problems with these bars.

It started with a couple of bags I picked up last fall. One of the wrappers had no chocolate at all in it! It was sealed nicely, nestled in amongst its buddies, but was completely empty. I felt disappointed and deceived. In the very next bag I bought, one of the chocolates looked like it had a bite out of it. I called the Hershey’s customer service people, but they really didn’t seem to care at all. “Yeah, the machines will do that sometimes,” was the best I got out of them.

Isn’t this a quality control issue? Shouldn’t somebody be notified? Reluctantly, the customer service lady finally agreed to send me a coupon so that I could get a new bag. That was nice, but couldn’t she have assured me that my phone call helped improve quality, and that they’d take measures to fix things?

Maybe I’m glad she didn’t, because with higher expectations, disappointment is only greater. Now I’m dealing with two bags in a row of the “with almonds” wrappers, without even an atom of almond in sight. I keep unwrapping my little almond chocolate wrappers, only to find no almonds. Not even one little itty-bitty piece. I took a picture, but it does no justice at all to my distress. I guess if I expected that Hershey’s cared at all about quality control in their “no sugar added” line, I’d feel even worse.

Still, when you find the best thing out there and it still has its bad moments, it’s pretty crushing. But not crushed almonds – they’ve gone missing.

by Allison