To understand the story of Chappies more clearly, let’s take it back to the mid-1930s, when Arthur Ginsberg had just finished school and was looking for work.
Arthur lived in Troyeville, where the big Chapelat Sweets factory was located 8 minutes away from his home. He managed to secure a job as the cost accountant for Chapelat, while studying for his Bcom degree at the University of Witwatersrand during night time.
By the early 1940s, Arthur had been made head of sales and marketing at Chapelat, as he was a great believer in advertising.
Chapelat produced a wide range of sweet products – from the cheapest toffees to the most expensive chocolates on the market.
OK Bazaars was Chapelat’s major customer but things took a huge turn when the company bought another confectionery supplier, Turnwrights, and dropped Chapelat like a hot coal.
This left Chapelat in a crisis and they needed a new line of business fast.
Arthur looked around the market and noticed that Wicks bubblegum were selling at a penny each. He wondered to himself about making a gum that could sell two for a penny.
He then experimented with a bubble gum base which Chapelat had gotten from the US. Its base was 100% synthetic and consisted of different rosins, which made up an inorganic substance become malleable when heated.
After it was heated, the base was then put into a large metal container for mixing. Addatives were added, alongside glucose and sugar. The function of the glucose was to help keep the sugar in a liquid state, as well as giving the chewer a bit of energy.
The bubble gum then went through an extruder, and came out in long strips. The strips were then cut and wrapped by machines. During that time, over 1200 Chappies were produced per minute.
Initially there were 5 flavours: pineapple, strawberry, lemon, orange and cherry. The gum was wrapped in a waxed paper, this ensured it didn’t stick to the paper.
According to Arthur, the name of the brand came during the experimental stages, he came up with an abbreviation of Chapelat, and that was Chappies.
MARKETING
To market Chappies, Arthur Ginsberg proved he was a genius.
He decided to make the brand appeal more to children by having 4 – Did You Know? – questions on the inside of each packaging. The strategy worked instantly, people who grew up in the 60s couldn’t wait to open their Chappies wrapper to unleash the 4 fun fact questions.
Arthur got all those questions from the Three Wise Men, a popular quiz programme on Springbok Radio. The three men were Arthur Bexley, Dennis Glauber and Eric Rosenthal.
To generate more fun fact questions, Arthur later approached academics from Wits, and asked for lists of questions.
During the first years of Chappies, there were around 5 000 to 6 000 questions generated, the questions were used more than once.
CHAPPIES CARTOON
To further market Chappies, Arthur didn’t end with the questions alone, he dabbled with other forms of marketing.
Arthur was the first person who took advertising space in The Sunday Times magazine in the form of a cartoon.
Every week, a Chappies cartoon drawn by Bob Connolly ran in the Sunday Times magazine. The depictions were simple and effective – a submarine or a hot air balloon sprung a leak, and it was plugged with Chappies.
From time to time new gimmicky brands were produced: a Donald Duck bubble gum, or a Beatles bubble gum with pictures of the famous rockstars.
MORE FLAVORS
Once Chapelat grabbed hold of the market with the 5 initial flavors, others were introduced as time went on: herbal, peppermint, spearmint, assorted fruit, grape and watermelon.
Just like how Coca Cola was found in every nook and cranny, Chappies was everywhere too. The brand became the biggest volume seller in the country and beyond.
In the 1970s, the brand held a 90% of bubble gum market and was exported to other African countries including the likes of Lesotho, Botswana, Swaziland, Zambia, the Congo and Zimbabwe.
The bubblegum brand has been so popular over the years that its name, ‘Chappies,’ has since became a genericized trademark, becoming synonymous with the word bubblegum.
In 1989, Cadbury acquired 100% of Chappies. To this day, Cadbury still owns and produces the bubblegum brand.
According to Ginsberg, Chappies didn’t make him a millionaire, it just gave him a comfortable life.
In May 2007, Arthur Ginsberg passed away aged 89, may his soul RIP. His legacy will live on for more decades to come…..
