Altoids are a brand of breath mints. The brand was created by the London-based Smith & Company in the 1780s, and later became part of the Callard & Bowser company in the 19th century. Their advertising slogan is "The Original Celebrated Curiously Strong Mints", referring to the high concentration of peppermint oil used in the original flavour lozenge.
Video Altoids
Marketing
Altoids are less widely available in Britain--their country of origin--than in the US to which they are exported. The mints are stocked in Morrisons. Marks & Spencer produces a near identical product called "Curiously Strong Mints". Unlike their marketing in the US, Altoids have never been heavily marketed in the UK. Callard & Bowser-Suchard once manufactured Altoids at a plant in Bridgend, Wales, but has since moved Altoids' production to an existing plant in Chattanooga, Tennessee, United States. This was done to manufacture the products closer to where they are primarily marketed. They were marketed for a brief period in the 1990s under the "Nuttall's" brand when Callard and Bowser was under the ownership of Terry's.
Maps Altoids
Flavours and varieties
Mints
Altoids mints are currently available in four flavours: peppermint, wintergreen, spearmint, and cinnamon. "Sugar-Free Smalls", tiny square mints sweetened with sorbitol and sucralose, are also available in peppermint, wintergreen, and cinnamon. In 2007, dark chocolate-dipped mints were introduced in three flavours: peppermint, cinnamon and ginger and in 2008, dark chocolate-dipped mints were introduced in crème de menthe. The chocolate dipped varieties were discontinued in 2010. Also historically made but no longer available were ginger, liquorice, cool honey, and (non-chocolate dipped) creme de menthe varieties. Circa early 2011, Altoids altered the ingredients of their Wintergreen mints, adding blue food colouring. Altoid mints labeled "sugar-free smalls" that do contain gelatin.
Sours
Sour hard sweets in round tins were introduced in 2004 but were discontinued in 2010 due to low sales. Flavours included raspberry, citrus, apple, tangerine, and mango. Limited edition passion fruit sours were also released around Valentine's Day in 2005 in a larger 2.3 oz tin instead of the standard 1.76 oz sours tins that had been released up until then.
Gum
The sugar-free chewing gum, introduced in 2003, was made in the United States. Flavours include peppermint, cinnamon, spearmint, wintergreen and two sour flavours, cherry and apple. The gum has not been seen in stock in US stores since January 2010 and has been discontinued.
Altoids Strips
In 2003, breath strips in peppermint and cinnamon flavours were introduced. They were discontinued and are no longer available.
Altoids Arctic
In 2014, Eclipse Mints, another Wrigley product, were rebranded as Altoids Arctic, with the tin remaining identical save for labeling. The rebranded mints were released in only Peppermint, Wintergreen, and Strawberry, doing away with the wider varieties of Eclipse such as Cinnamon, Winterfrost and several other flavors, as well as the chewables. As before, each tin contains 1.2 oz (34g), or about 50 mints.
Altoids tins
The distinctive tin cases in which Altoids mints are packaged are often reused for other purposes. They have long served as containers for household items like paper clips, coins, sewing materials and other small items.
The tins are sometimes used to house electronic projects. BeagleBone, a single-board computer made by Texas Instruments, is deliberately shaped with rounded corners to fit inside the tin. The CMoy pocket headphone amplifiers also often use Altoid tin as an enclosure. A Retrocomputing hobbyist computer, the RCA 1802-based Membership Card microcomputer kit, is designed to fit in an Altoids tin.
Chemical Fingerprinting Experiment
In an experiment conducted by Griffin Analytical Technologies LLC, Indiana, United States, Altoids were used to measure the efficiency of ion source. Flavored Altoids were held near the interface of the DART source until they burned. This produced fingerprint sample data that was used in the experiment.
Darden Case No. UVA-M-0705
In Darden Case No. UVA-M-0705 Altoids sales numbers are referenced and compared to Listerine breath strips. In the year 2000 Altoids achieved sales of $107 million and shortly declined to $90 million in sales revenue after only two years. The decline in sales is in part due to the success of PocketPaks breath strips which produced $110 million in sales revenue in less than a year.
Altoids Award
In 2007 at the grand opening of The New Museum of Contemporary Art Altoids announced the biennial Altoids Award. A cash prize of $25,000 is awarded to four individual artists from around the country. Winners have their art exhibited at the museum after the rigorous selection process is completed. The first winners were chosen by Paul McCarthy, Cindy Sherman, and Rirkrit Tiravanija.
First aid and survival
Altoids tins have also been popular with outdoor enthusiasts for many years as first-aid or mini survival kit containers. A name for these kits is Bug-Out Altoids Tins, or BOATs.
See also
- Fisherman's Friend
- List of breath mints
- Victory V
References
Further reading
- Grant, Jeremy. "New brands take a toll on Wrigley" Financial Times, London Ed. 26-Oct-2005, pg 27.
- Terdiman, Daniel. "Altoids, the curiously strong tin; The container stylishly stores battery chargers, iPods and more." New York Times 2-Feb-2005.
- "Wrigley to buy Altoids and Life Savers from Kraft." Candy Industry ISSN 0745-1032; Volume 169; Issue 11 1-Nov-2004.
- What's News. The Wall Street Journal, Business and Finance, pg A1. 15-Nov-2004.
- Pare, Mike. "Wrigley to invest $14M to make Altoids in its Chattanooga, Tenn., plant." Chattanooga Times/Free Press, Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News. 23-Aug-2005.
External links
- Official Altoids website
- Old site (redirects to store locator)
- Altoids Chewing Gum Articles
- The Altoids Curiously Strong Awards Video Clip
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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