As Halloween season passes, many people will sort through either their trick-or-treating spoils or through the discounted bags of candy they purchase in stores across the country. Among those various chocolates and other sweets, almost assuredly, will be so-called “fun-sized” treats.
These smaller versions of popular candies are made for trick-or-treating. With their lower costs and their smaller form-factor, they fit into plastic pumpkins and pillowcases with room to spare. However, the name “fun-sized” is not only a misnomer; it is a drastic misrepresentation.
Smaller versions of candies are fine. As stated, they work perfectly for Halloween, help lower the cost of candy for those who are willing to hand out these treats on the holiday and ensure that children do not eat massive amounts of sugary sweets in the days following All Hallows Eve.
The individual wrapping and small size also help parents by allowing them to check and ensure the candies are still sealed, in the age of constant fear over people putting harmful materials in Halloween candies given to children, even though there have been very few reports of this actually happening.
However, to call these small candies “fun-sized” is a blatant lie. In what world is less candy somehow more fun? To call them miniatures is fine, as Reese’s does, or simply smaller versions of the larger candy, as KitKat has done with some versions of its product.
These smaller versions of candy, rebranded or unbranded without the “fun-size” name, are still problematic, though. The individual packaging, often double-bagged in crinkly plastic, is highly wasteful. Their necessity for Halloween helps balance out the un-environmental aspects, but miniature, individually wrapped candies should be reserved for that special circumstance. The positives of individually wrapped candies disappear when Halloween passes because, honestly, how many KitKats would people share out of that 10-serving bag, really? More often, people simply unwrap a few pieces at a time, which does help limit binge consumption, but at the end of the day, the same limitation on consumption could have been achieved through only eating half of a regularly sized bar.
According to Greenmatters.com, an ecologically-focused news agency, individually wrapped candies are actually the most harmful aspect of the global chocolate industry because of the sheer amount of plastic that goes into their production. Milk chocolate is another harmful aspect of the global chocolate industry because of the need for cow’s milk to flavor the candy.
Environmentalists the world over suggest that if one wishes to become a more environmentally-conscious chocolate consumer, they should stop purchasing individually wrapped, “fun size” candies and focus on small-batch, fair-trade, dark chocolate. The environmental costs are reduced by the removal of methane-producing cows, the potential for exploitation of laborers in chocolate-producing countries is negated by fair trade certification, and dark chocolate is far healthier to eat when compared to sugary milk chocolate.
Photo by Maria Pericozzi | The Oswegonian
