anybody remember wispa?

Cadbury is to bring back the Wispa chocolate bar after a campaign on websites like Facebook and MySpace to demand its return.

The chocolate company says that it is frequently contacted by consumers asking for old favourites to be reintroduced, but said the numbers that had joined the internet campaign to re-launch Wispa were unprecedented.

Tony Bilsborough, at Cadbury, said: “We get letters about the Aztec bar and the lime barrel in the Dairy Milk tray. But this is on a whole different scale. This is the first time we are going to give the internet a chance to prove itself and see whether it is all hype or genuine.”

The project to bring back the aerated chocolate bar has seen people broadcast short films on YouTube. Social networking sites such as MySpace and YouTube have various groups, with thousands of members, dedicated to the veneration of he Wispa bar.
Cadbury will make an initial run of 23 million of the bars from October 7 and gauge interest from there. The new bar will cost 42 pence – the original cost 16 pence.

Wispa was first brought out in 1981 for a trial in the north east. The bar with a bubbly centre was seen by many as a rival to Nestlé’s Aero bar with the slogan “Bite it and Believe It”.

The television adverts included Yes Minister’s Paul Eddington and Nigel Hawthorne, Victoria Wood and Julie Walters and Hi De Hi’s Simon Cadell and Ruth Madoc.

Its popularity began to wane in the 1990s and it was finally ditched in 2003 as Cadbury concentrated on other brands but die hard fans of Wispa demanded its return.

Earlier this year two fans stormed the stage at Glastonbury during Iggy Pop’s set to hold up a “Bring Back Wispa” banner – a stunt, which took the company by surprise, Mr Bilsborough insisted. “There has been no Machiavellian plan, I can assure you.”
Brand expert and consultant Robert Opie said: “We have a great affection for the treats of our youth. Knowing that a much-loved brand from our past will be making a comeback is bound to titillate the memory buds.”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/08/18/nwispa118.xml