Mambas' Claim Leaves Sour Taste in Mouth?

I love Mambas. They are nice counter-points to Starburst, a welcome candy competitor in the chewy fruit market. In addition, Mambas have two unique qualities: First, their flavors include raspberry, which is quite rare in the US market (of course, this owes largely to Storck's primarily European market). Second, their packaging is entirely unique. For one, it is made for portability. Within each long package, there are three separate packages, each containing 6 chews of the same flavor. Also, there is an element of mystery each time you purchase Mambas, because out of the four flavors-- Lemon, Orange, Raspberry, and Strawberry-- there are only three in each large package. Sometimes you might not even get the raspberry flavor that I just mentioned. That can be frustrating, but on the whole, I kind of like the fact that you get some Forrest Gumpery each time you get Mambas.



All this said, I have an issue with Mambas and the Storck corporation. They have recently added a "sour" line to their product, and generally, I would be celebrating this addition with glee. However, on the package, Mambas announce that their new sour candies have "long-lasting sour" flavor.This could not be farther from the truth. Personally, I can barely detect any sour flavor. When I ate the first sour Mamba, I actually looked back at the package to ensure that I had not inadvertently picked up the regular Mambas.



There is so little sour flavoring there, that one is astounded that Storck would openly advertise some notion of "long-lasting"-ness in their product. Granted, the Mambas are still solid; I enjoyed eating each one of them. However, I have come to expect way more from my sour candies, and a corporation throwing its hat into the ring should do a little more work to make sure that they do not go making outlandish claims on their packaging. Here is a list, from sourest to least sour, displaying where these sour Mambas fall on the pucker scale:

--Warheads
--Cry Babys
--Sour Skittles
--Sour Starburst
--Sour Patch Kids
--Sour Dots
--Trolli Sour Brite Crawlers
--Any sour gummi product
--My facial expression after hearing pop radio
--Sugar
--Sour Mambas

Perhaps Storck is not as familiar with the US market as it could be(?), but that is still no excuse. Get your house in order, Storck. I'll be watching.

I'm going to give you some time to fix this because you provide over two and a half ounces of candy per package, a 50% increase over most US brands. But god help you if you ever reduce your weight!

Look closely at the bottom right corner -- 2.65 oz. That is some good value, ya'll.