Zagnut

Zagnut
Product type Confectionery
Owner The Hershey Company
Country United States
Introduced 1930
Previous owners
Ambassador(s) Ryan Morse, 1926-Present
Website Official Zagnut website

Zagnut is a candy bar produced and sold in the United States. It was launched in 1930 by the D. L. Clark Company, which sold it to Leaf later on and was acquired by Hershey Foods Corporation in 1996. Its main ingredients are peanut brittle with cocoa and toasted coconut, and it weighs 1.75 ounces (50 g).

History

Unlike many candy bars, it contains no chocolate, though it does have a small amount of cocoa. Since Zagnuts have no chocolate to melt, they have seen a resurgence in popularity among US troops in places like Iraq and Afghanistan. Stateside, candy and convenience stores stock Zagnut unevenly, since it has only a niche market. It resembles a Butterfinger.

The origin of the name "Zagnut" is uncertain; the "nut" part presumably comes from either the coconut coating or the peanut center, while the "zag" could be a reference to zigzag, a slang phrase popular when the bar was created in the 1930s.

In the 1960s, Zagnut made fun of its unlikely name with a TV commercial created by Stan Freberg starring Mel Blanc. In the spot, a candy-company exec (played by Frank Nelson) is horrified to discover a computer has given the name "Zagnut" to its newest product, and says, "That is without a doubt the lousiest name for a candy bar I've ever heard!" In the end, he is forced to keep the name since millions of Zagnut wrappers have already been printed. Freberg himself gives the tagline: "A Zagnut by any other name...would be a good thing."[1]

In Film

  • Zagnut is famous in a scene of Tim Burton's 1988 horror-comedy Beetlejuice, where he used it to lure a fly to him.
  • In the 1980 movie Seems Like Old Times, Chevy Chase, a fugitive from the law, attempts to purchase a candy bar from a gas station vending machine. After the machine “steels” his money, he forces (at gunpoint with an empty gun) the attendant to open the machine, and Chase walks away with a handful of Zagnut bars.
  • In the 1982 movie 48 Hrs., Nick Nolte facetiously hands Eddie Murphy a Zagnut candy bar for dinner.
  • In the 1988 movie The Great Outdoors John Candy throws a Zagnut bar at some bears to lure them in for a closer look.
  • In the 2008 movie Hancock, the title character portrayed by Will Smith foils a convenience store robbery by using a Zagnut bar as a high speed projectile.
  • In the 2011 TV series The Killing, season 2 episode 4, titled Ogi Jun. Detective Linden bribes an inmate with a Zagnut bar for information about a tattoo.
  • In the 2016 TV series Preacher, season 2 episode 8, titled Holes. A vending machine in hell only has Zagnut bars (in brown wrapping).
  • In the 2017 Amazon.com series The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, season 1 episode 4, titled The Disappointment of the Dionne Quintuplets. A woman buys a Zagnut bar after Susie describes a Hershey's bar as a laxative.
  • In the 2017 TV series American Dad!, season 12 episode 10, titled A Nice Night For A Drive, Stan and Klaus act as vigilantes avenging the strong-arm thefts of Zagnut bars, by the Appalachian Trail Chop-shop Candy Gang (a.k.a the Zagnut Boys).

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Zagnut Commercial". YouTube. 2010-09-08. Retrieved 2012-02-26.
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