Does anyone remember the Yorkie advert? (chocolate bar)

14 comments

1. They were successful campaigns precisely because they were designed to attract publicity beyond that which the brand paid for. Times have changed though. It wouldn’t fly today. It worked very well for them then though.

2. You don’t, it was:

   ‘NOT FOR GIRLS’

3. I remember the advert with the lorry driver…

4. How did tobacco firms get away with advertising their fags as healthier than others?

   It’s pointless trying to judge historical events in the context of today’s mores. “The past is a foreign country.”

5. I was a child when that ad came out, I still bought it and never once thought I wasn’t worthy of it.

6. It was basically a joke.

   If you think about other well known chocolate ads, say, Galaxy, which was clearly very heavily marketed for women, even if the ad didn’t explicitly say it.

   And before that, milk tray had the tag line “and all because the lady loves Cadbury’s milk tray”

   So most chocolate ads at the time, and earlier, heavily leant towards women.

   Yorkie basically decided to market their chocolate bar to men, and call it out in blunt yet tongue in cheek way.

   Maybe wouldn’t necessarily fly today, or maybe it would? It was making a joke at the expense of the the already gendered advertising of chocolate, rather than specifically women or men.

7. Because it was a joke, and people had a better sense of humour back then.

8. Also, see the Yorkie that was put in ration packs for soldiers. [“NOT FOR CIVVIES”](https://imgur.com/2SuX2Zf.jpg).

9. I remember McCoys were also “man crisps” seems like yesterday but musta been years ago

10. It was a joke and considering it was a hugely popular chocolate bar, it didn’t put people off.

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    People had a sense of humor back then instead of looking for any excuse to head to twitter and have a cry.

11. Because of this ad when I was a little kid I actually thought it was illegal for girls to eat Yorkies. When I saw one in my dads cupboard one day I couldn’t resist, I quickly scarfed it down. When I was done I tore the package up into tiny pieces and prayed that the police weren’t going to come and haul me away.

12. In a way it was on a stroke of genius

    The ‘manly men’ and the ‘Lads’ will buy the chocolate for themselves and go “haha it’s not for girls”

    The women would go “why TF can’t I have it?” And buy it when they usually would pick other options in a mixture of low key rebellion and standing up for themselves

    The people who liked the bar before wouldn’t boycott it as whilst controversial then it wouldn’t generate the scandal such a tasteless ad would now

    And honestly it came at the right time (from a marketing point of view) a sweet spot for them whereby it would’ve garnered controversy and press (all press is good press kinda thing ) and been a talking point Whilst simulatiously not going past the ‘obviously wrong, wtf where they thinking’ line (again, I stress for that particular time period as earlier no one would care and later too many people would care) so after the buzz the initial adverts wouldve caused, they then just fell into being another slogan but with the new fan bases as detailed above

13. I actually really liked the slogan – I thought it was funny.

14. i think it also came in plain manly dark blue wrapper with a girl in a circle and a cross through her to show no girls.