This Discontinued Chocolate Bar Rivaled KitKat In The '70s; Boomers Remember It Well

When you see a brand of snack from your childhood get discontinued, even one you didn't eat yourself, it can be pretty disorienting. If you never knew a world without Scooby-Doo fruit snacks, for example, seeing them disappear is a reminder that nothing is permanent — not you, your way of life, nor your favorite merchandise-driven franchise starring a talking dog. This is all to say that we understand why boomers get nostalgic over the discontinued Cadbury's Bar Six, a KitKat-like bar that was big in the 1970s but was eventually taken off the shelves.

You may know Cadbury as the British brand of chocolates you see sold in CVS (American production and distribution is done by Hershey, which is why they taste so much worse than the ones in Britain — in fact, they're our pick for the worst chocolate bar), but they offer more than just those pretty purple-wrapped candy bars. Once upon a time, they made Bar Six, a wafer chocolate bar enhanced with hazelnut cream (differentiating it from the similar KitKat bar, a comparison made more obvious by their matching orange wrappers). Bar Six never made it stateside (although it was sold in Canada), but boomers still recall it fondly. "Oh my god! My fave as a kid but nobody else has ever heard of it!" said one Redditor. Meanwhile, a post on Instagram claimed that it was "more opulent than a KitKat, and a bit more substantial." And who doesn't want an opulent candy bar?

So, what happened to Bar Six? Did people lose their appetite for wafer chocolate bars? KitKat is still alive and well despite the resounding disappointment of its Chocolate Frosted Donut flavor, so the answer is clearly no. Did Cadbury tweak the recipe in some deeply offensive manner? Nope — the recipe remained the same throughout its existence. No, Bar Six's fate may come down to a fatal change in its wrapper. 

In the 1980s, Cadbury changed the bar's wrapper from orange to purple to bring it more in line with the rest of its offerings. It's possible this change contributed to a decline in Bar Six's sales, whether from customers overlooking it among several other purple-wrapped bars or just from a lack of interest due to the change. In any case, the bar was discontinued not long afterwards, going away sometime in the '80s. Could it be brought back? It's certainly possible — we know Cadbury is doing just fine without it, but nostalgia is a powerful thing. "They were my childhood favourite chocolate bar," said one internet commentor. "I doubt that Cadburys [sic] will remake this, but would like it to make a comeback." What a delightfully understated, British way to ask for an old candy back.