Good & Delish Dark & Sinful Pear & Almond - Walgreen's: Pennsauken, NJ
If you've listened to our most recent Candyology101 podcast, you'll recognize this bar from my rants and ramblings about store-branded candy. Way back in July, I bought and reviewed THIS pear and almond bar from whole foods, which was a store-branded item, and I thought it was really delicious. Even though I liked it a lot, I rarely shop at Whole Foods because things can get pretty expensive, and it's a bit out of my way, so I hadn't had another bar since.
Flash forward to winter's ever awesome cold and flu season. I was at Walgreens picking up my cold medication and I noticed the same flavor combination was being offered in their Good & Delish candy bar line. Could these be the same bars? The Walgreen's version was really affordable, and I figured I deserved a little treat since I was sick, so I picked it up. Oddly enough we decided that our theme for the most recent podcast would be store brands, so this worked out awesomely. I know I already talked about it in the podcast, but I figured this item was worthy of it's own post.
The packaging is similar in form and function to the Whole Foods bar, but the design is very different. The Whole Foods bar (which I'll abbreviate as WF from this point forward, because typing it over and over will drive me insane), had a brighter, more colorful, design with faux texturing and UV-coated detailing. Although this bar has the same flavoring as the WF bar, it's layout is very different. The Walgreen's version is bold and black with a modern layout and a limited color palette. If you removed the Delish logo from the top of this bar, I think it looks like a really fancy and high end product! That clunky Delish logo needs some tweaking, it's the weakest part of this design, but I gotta say, I like this package more than the WF one. It's sleek, modern, and the only things that would make it even fancier is if the letters had been embossed.
Inside the bar was wrapped with foil, and apparently it bloomed a bit on the shelves, but wait...are these the same freaking chocolate bar?
One of the photos above is the bar from WF, the other is the one from Walgreens. They look the same! They both say the chocolate is from Belgium, the chocolate bars have the same odd segmented indentations, and the same flavor combination. Could this candy bar actually be a repackaging of the fancy one from Whole Foods? I mean, both of these are store-branded items, are they really just repackaged versions of the same thing at two different price points at two different stores? Well, let's throw another wrench into this mix. Apparently both of these bars could be re-packagings of the same bar from this company, and you can even buy it at Walmart. They're all the same freaking bar! Don't be duped by fancy Whole Foods packaging, you can buy literally the same thing at Walgreens or even Walmart.
With all that candy sleuthing, I took a bite of the Walgreens bar to see if it tasted exactly the same.
I gotta say, it might be because this bar is a bit less bloomed than the one I had from WF, but this one tasted more pear-y to me. It has the same thin slivered bits of dried pear as the WF version, and there are a few bits of almond in there, but I think it's really just the same bar. I might have gotten a slightly fresher one this time, hence the stronger pear flavoring.
Is it yummy? Sure, I love the flavor combination of pear with dark chocolate and almond, it's delicious, but now that I know it's all the same thing, I'll save myself the trip and the money from Whole Foods and buy myself either the Walmart or the Walgreens version. This goes to show that store brands can be tricky, Whole Foods makes their bar seem fancier with their little write up about using the best chocolate from Belgium and all that, and it may, but it's no different from this candy bar, or the one sold at Walmart. Not so fancy now, are you? Sometimes store-branded items are just repackaging of better known brands, and in this case, that's true, so save yourself a few bucks and give store brands a try. Sometimes you'll be presently surprised. (Or slightly annoyed at yourself, or is that just me? How could I not tell they were all the same candy bar? Bah!)
© Maria Smith http://poison-and-antidote.net
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Thanks so much for this info. I live far too close to a whole foods, and like you I frequently feel like a deserve a treat. I feel dizzy thinking of the money I've wasted on WF chocolate bars. The funny thing is, I've loved the Walgreens Delish salted Carmel squares so I already know they are capable of a good product. I just never made the connection that some things could be made by the same company. I'm going to Walgreens tomorrow for my own research!
ReplyDeleteThis is so timely...my friends and I had a chocolate tasting this week as we found a few odd bars at our local Grocery Outlet. The brands were Simply Enjoy and Hageland. I happened to also have on hand the Whole Foods Pear and Almond bar...and just like this one of yours, they were all the same! Same chocolate, same slivers of nuts and same mold/packaging. The off brand ones of ours were bloomed too...but it didn't stop us from taste testing. ;)
ReplyDeleteJust picked up several ON SALE in Lincoln Nebraska for 57 Cents!
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