Global Warming Kills Nestle Marketing Effort

Here at TDPC headquarters, we don't receive much mail in the old fashioned, Canada Post kind of way. This is partly because we're very hitech and have online billing for most services, online banking, paperless this and virtual that. It's also because rural mail carriers, and ours in particular, seem to be taking the law into their own hands when it comes to dealing with high gas prices and only dropping by on days they feel like it.

However, the planets and stars did align sufficiently one day last week, and we did receive a piece of mail, from Nestle Canada, assisted by Shoppers Drug Mart. This mailing is a slick, glossy marketing brochure for a new kind of Nestle chocolate: Nestle Noir. It's an attempt to cash in on the trend toward more premium chocolate products, with a 70% cocoa offering. Hershey is doing the same thing, although much too little and too late.

The fun part is that enclosed in the glossy mailer was a square of the new Nestle Noir 70% cocoa chocolate. Now, it was about 29 degrees Celsius here on the day the mailing arrived. Here's the instructions provided by Nestle for enjoying their chocolate. I'll leave it to you to decide how this might turn out in 29 degree weather:

• With a square of the chocolate in hand, rub it between your fingers to release the oils and take in the intense cocoa aroma.
• Take a bite and let the chocolate melt on your tongue for 20 seconds, allow it to cover your palate.
• Let your senses savour the moment.

Somebody ought to connect Nestle marketing with a weather report and climate statistics for Eastern Ontario at this time of year.