Featured Image Credit: Richard Baker/Getty Images
Topics: UK Food, Social Media
Ben Williams
If there’s one thing that reliably unites the UK public at this time of year, it’s the shared ritual of cracking open a festive tub of chocolates the moment the heating goes on.
Whether you’re loyally defending your favourites, sneakily fishing for the good ones before anyone else gets home, or bracing yourself for the annual Bounty-based argument that erupts across the internet, these tubs have come to define winter snacking in a way few other treats can match.
From the nostalgia of seeing a bright plastic tub plonked on the coffee table to the quiet disappointment of realising someone has already eaten every last Galaxy, the humble box of Celebrations has become an unmistakable part of the season.
As ever, nothing spreads across social media faster than a photo exposing the harsh reality of what’s actually inside one.
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However, one fan has gone a step further by tipping out the entire contents and arranging every single chocolate into neat little rows: only to realise the ratios inside were far from what they’d hoped for.
The Reddit user shared the layout and declared: “Like any other rational human, I prefer the galaxy (normal and caramel) and the greatest of them all: the Malteser. I am dissatisfied!”
Unsurprisingly, fellow users quickly joined in to share the dread.
One person summed up the collective mood by responding: “When you lay it out like that, it's absolutely nothing in those things”, while another was equally unimpressed, saying: “Forget the ratio! That amount in total is shocking!”, both honing in on the fact that the lesser amount of chocolates you get per tub in generally these days is equally gutting to see.
Others focused on exactly which chocolates were causing the biggest upset, with one user calling the imbalance ‘bordering on criminal’ thanks to the sheer number of Bounties compared with the likes of Malteasers and Galaxy.
Someone else didn’t hold back their disbelief either, stating: “Only three malteasers, that is bloody outrageous."
It’s a sentiment echoed across multiple threads as people continue to accuse modern tubs of shrinkflation, pointing out how noticeably lighter they feel compared to the hefty versions from years gone by.
Several commenters shared similar experiences of finding far fewer chocolates than expected, while one insisted that ‘we used to be a real country’ before the confectionery tub ratios seemingly shifted.
In classic British fashion, the entire ordeal has sparked a mixture of despair, humour and full-blown snack conspiracy theories.
While some defended the much-debated Bounty with a breezy ‘Bounty slander will not be tolerated’, the majority made it clear that the lack of Galaxy and Maltesers remains the greatest seasonal tragedy of all.
If it’s anything like the recent drama over the Celebrations Advent calendar, maybe the chocolate brand will get this resolved by next year, too.
FOODbible has reached out to Mars, which owns Celebrations, for comment.