I’m a little upset at how easily advertising campaigns find a way to burrow into my consciousness. If we were in one of those word association games that supporting characters on TV shows always use to help the protagonists understand what they really want, my immediate response to “3 Musketeers” would be “Big on chocolate, not on fat.”
(I know you expected me to say “Framing device used in Danny Boyle’s 2008 Oscar-winning film, ‘Slumdog Millionaire.'” Frankly, I’m surprised, too.)
That response comes before “classic literature”, “candy bar” and “Dartagnan.” Surely, I immediately associate the campaign with the candy bar, but that’s secondary; the ad is what I remember.
This strikes me for two reasons: 1) It’s not a particularly apt slogan (Why is this literary reference being used to brand a candy bar as healthy?) and 2) 3 Musketeers has never been a candy bar I’ve paid a lot of attention to (think on it: When have you seen a kid go out of his or her way to take a 3 Musketeers out of the Halloween candy bowl of assorted M&M-Mars snacks?).
My best guess toward the origin of this slogan stickiness is that when the impressionable, chubby, insecure little fella I was when I was a kid, the same one who sometimes wondered how a kid might dial 1-800-Jenny to enroll without his parents finding out, saw the ad and the slogan, he stored it away as a thing to be eating when he was looking to lose a few LBs.
Of course, that logic is pure bullshit. There may be less fat (the dietary boogeyman of the ’90s, succeeded by carbs in the ’00s and gluten in the present) in 3 Musketeers than other candy bars, but at 250 calories (of mainly sugar) per bar, the 3 Musketeers is just as unhealthy.
Regardless of its factual composition, still, the slogan is what I remember. Which is interesting. I don’t know what it means, really. But it seems to be a thing.
Tasting Notes
– Don’t take those words above, though, to mean I feel negatively about the taste of a 3 Musketeers. It might be one of the more underrated bars in the game.
– The nougat is just light enough to allow for the chocolate shell to be appreciated, but weighty enough that it’s not like eating marshmallow. Big fan.
– I never liked 3 Musketeers that much as a kid. Does this mean I’m growing up?
– He says, on his candy bar blog.
Breaking Off A Piece 