Monday, October 01, 2007

charming innovation

as it turns out, i'm not the only person who likes the lucky charms cereal more than the lucky charms marshmallow enough to pick around the charms to eat the grain. ultimately the marshmallows get eaten slowly over the duration of the process with the majority of them awaiting me at the bottom of the box.
it occurred to me that the good people at general mills should package their product in a new way: separate bags of cereal and marshmallows packaged in the same box, allowing every
lucky charms enthusiast to personalise each bowl of cereal. eat a bowl full of cereal, then a bowl full of marshmallows, then mix the two to your hearts desired proportions.
for general mills the advantages are obvious. eating the two ingredients in different proportions means one could often run out of one ingredient before another, sending the consumer back to the grocery for another box so they can mix some marshmallows with that leftover cereal.
... and i'm sure their marketing department could come up with an advertising campaign for the newly bagged cereal. perhaps something about lucky (the leprechaun) trying to hide his charms from a band of pirates who of course find them and separate the riches from the worthless (in their opinion) dubbing the new cereal
lucky charrrms, or maybe lucky booty, though parents may not wanna buy lucky booty for their children.
i sent
general mills this comment:

as someone who loves a large variety of your cereals i often find myself enjoying them piece by piece, straight out of the box. this is particularly true with "lucky charms." i so often will eat just the cereal leaving marshmallows behind only devour them later. i’d like to suggest you could market "lucky charms" in a new way. you could keep the product in the current size boxes but package the cereal and the marshmallows in two separate, half-size bags; the idea being that one could eat only the marshmallows, the cereal and/or a mix them in any proportions. imagine, you could have a different bowl of "lucky charms" every time. after discussion with others i realised i wasn't the only "lucky charms" fan with this desire, and it suddenly seemed like a worthy idea. i also fell in love with your "nature's valley" oat and honey cereal. as an avid outdoorsman and health nut, i've always counted on "nature's valley" granola bars for energy. if the options aren't already in the works, i hope to see additional granola versions of the cereal, and would suggest peanut butter (for the kids) and banana-nut.

old school lucky looked so much cooler, don'tcha think?
ps. when general mills decides to use my idea and you find yourself thanking the cereal gods (snap, crackle and pop) for reinventing an old favourite, remember where you heard about lucky charrrms. you're welcome.

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