The world of marketing and the fact that these are often placed near tills means that we are gethering quite a collection.

WHERE CAN I BUY THEM AND HOW MUCH DO THEY COST?

Most supermakrkets, local chemists, newsagents; in fact, anywhere relying on the fact that there are frazzled parents trying to get quickly out of the shop!
Mine cost 99p and I do believe this is the only price at which they are sold.

WHAT ARE THEY?

For your 99p, you get a long tube with a character's head on the top- the ones they are "plugging at the moment seem to be Chicken Little and Madagascar. (That does surprise me!)
Also contained enticingly behind that plastic cover are 3 little packets of Pez sweets- strawberry, lemon and orange. each of these packets does, I believe, contain 12 tiny sweets.

HOW DO I USE IT?

Flip up the character's head and a tube rather like the inside of a stapler is revealed. Like a stapler, this has to be filled with the small rectangular sweets- one packet of the sweets fills it completely.

To remove the sweets, the head must again be flipped back (head of the character, not to potential eater) and one small sweet will push forward ever so slightly. It can then be removed and eaten. Then the process is repeated until all of the sweets which have been painstakingly added to the tube are eaten.

WHAT DO THEY TASTE OF?

Not surprisingly, the sweets do taste of strawberry, lemon and orange, depending on which ones you eat. They are very hard and require sucking before the crunching commences, but once you get to the crunch, they are a bit fizzy, almost like sherbet.

WARNINGS

It is suggested that these are not suitable for children under the age of 3 years because small parts could be swallowed or inhaled.

I suggest they are not given to anyone as small parts can lead to frustration.

WEBSITE

There is a website which is in German...www.pez.com

OTHER CHARACTERS

There appear to be hundreds of characters- every event and film is taken care of. If you go on the website, they don't list them in characters but in series, and each of the 38 series seems to have 3 or 4 characters. That's a lot of 99p payments to collect these tubes.

VERDICT...

At the risk of appearing a "Bah humbug" type of person, I have to say no.

The sweets are extremely fiddly to get inside the tube, and this is the point at which the funa and games commences. Little miss hopping about waiting for her sweets, which are undeniably tasty, and mum trying frantically to get them in. The most I have managed at any one time has been 6 without them popping back out. They are proudly handed over, consumed within seconds and then the tube handed back for a refill.

There also appears to be no way to buy sweet refills so for the pleasure of the 36 mini sweets, you have to hand over 99p and have another tube with a character's head on top to add to your ever growing collection.


From a child's point of view, they are of course very appealing and enticing. They love to collect the latest characters and as I said, the sweets are fizzy sweets which appeal to children. However, if they removed them from checkouts, I don't think they would sell as many, because there are "cooler" things to collect.

So, in conclusion, I would say buy them if you are an extremely patient person or particularly dextrous. If instant gratification is required, then steer clear

For now, I am going to try to fill this irritating chicken who is sitting looking at me, ready for little miss coming home from school.

Thanks for reading.

Daniela x

(The title is the marketing devise, not my own thoughts!)