The dilemma of the cut off tips on Hershey kisses continues
The mystery of the broken tip on the Hershey kiss continues.
It’s been challenging trying to find out why the tops on some of the candy pieces have been cut off.
Debbie Sheetz from Greensburg discovered this imperfection and was the first to alert her 11,458 baking friends who belong to the Wedding Cookie Table Community Facebook page. She was preparing to make peanut butter blossoms for Christmas and started to unwrap the Hershey kisses when she noticed the tips were broken off and she didn’t see any loose tips in the bag so she called the company and was told since they typically break off in transit they were being cut off in the factory.
“And I said, ‘Are you kidding me?’” she says. “So I posted this on Facebook and people could not believe that was the reason. So I called back and was told there was a manufacturing problem. So they told me they would send me some free coupons.”
But that’s not what she wanted.
She was after an answer to know why this was happening. She says if she were making cookies for her daughter’s wedding or some other once-in-a-lifetime event she would be extremely upset the kisses were cut off.
“I wasn’t getting the quality I expect from Hershey’s,” Sheetz says. “I want to support local companies, because that is important, and Hershey is a Pennsylvania company. I buy Hershey chocolate chips when I am making chocolate chip cookies. This is just wrong what is happening with these kisses being broken.”
It certainly is, agrees Wedding Cookie Table Community Facebook member Tamsen Mongelli DiBlasio, formerly of the Banksville area of Pittsburgh, who now lives in Baltimore, MD.
“We are paying for both taste and presentation,” says DiBlasio, who contacted Hershey via email and Facebook. “Bakers take pride in their craftsmanship. We expect quality from Hershey.”
She says her husband John created the photo of an Elf on the Shelf cutting off the tips of the kisses with scissors which is gaining in popularity.
DiBlasio is skeptical because they are being told two different stories. She did receive a vague response via Facebook but not from her email on the company’s website. She says her question to Hershey is “What do you plan to do about this?”
The Hershey Company director of corporate communications Jeff Beckman says in an email “We are looking into this issue now. We understand that bakers’ expectations are high for an iconic brand that is more than 100 years old because they are proud of their desserts.”
He adds the issue is with the classic solid milk chocolate kisses which are made in Hershey and says he “doesn’t believe anyone from Hershey said they break off.” The company did announce a price increase in October which will affect less than 20 percent of its product and was not specifically targeted for kisses.
He says via email it will take some time to rectify this.
“I don’t have timing at this point, but products are made several months in advance, so any resolution will take a few months to get into the market,” he says.
Hershey has agreed to participate in the Wedding Cookie Table Community’s annual Cookie College coming May 5 at a site to be determined, says Laura Magone, of Monongahela, who is the page administrator. The dilemma is a strange one because it’s not every package, Magone says.
“This got my attention, because more and more of our members were posting about this, and one says she was told they were breaking them off intentionally, because they were breaking in transit,” she says. “Bakers are proud and they don’t want broken kisses. We have heard from members all over the country on this. The bakers want answers.”
