Le Chewing-Gum

A bag of various Wrigley products has been in the trunk of my car for a couple of months now, ever since I took a press tour of the new Wrigley R&D facility on Goose Island in Chicago in September, which I wrote about professionally, but not here. As a parting gift, the Wm. Wrigley Jr. Co. gave all us press mice a bag full of its products.

We examined the contents of the bag today, since I told Lilly I would give it to her for her birthday. What a variety it is. I had no idea. My idea of Wrigley gum is the standard three: yellow, white and green packs, the variety that my grandma always had around. But this is the 21st century. Wrigley’s locked toe-to-toe against Cadbury, and each is busy coming up with new products (hence the new R&D facility). In the bag I received, I found:

Juicy Fruit sours (New!), Juicy Fruit grapermelon (sic) (Longer Lasting!), Juicy Fruit strappleberry (sic, I’m beginning to see a pattern here).

Hubba Bubba Triple Treat, 6 feet of bubble gum, artificially flavored strawberry, watermelon and blueberry; Hubba Bubba sour double berry; and Hubba Bubba Max cherry-lemon.

Three kinds of Eclipse gum (powerfully crisp, surprisingly fresh, and uniquely soothing, respectively) and three kinds of Eclipse mints, which don’t have the adverb+adjective combos on the packs.

Eight kinds of Orbit gum, and four species of Extra gum, plus one companion mint variety for each of those two brands.

Big League Chew, “the ballplayers’ bubble gum.” New! Sour Cherry, and Swingin’ Sour Apple (I guess ballplayers like it sour out there on the field).

Big Red, artificially flavored cinnamon that you know is hot, because the package is red and has a little flame head as a mascot.

Winterfresh, “Icy cool breath that lasts,” with snow-covered mountain peaks to prove it.

Some of the gum varieties, made for export, have Chinese characters on them. But my favorite is a gum made in France, Wrigley’s sans sucre Freedent Professional. Avec Microgranules! On the back it says, copied here without proper diacriticals because I’m too lazy to add them, “Le chewing-gum developpe avec des experts en recherché dentaire qui vous procure le plaisir du gout et la sensation dents propres!”

Le Chewing-Gum? Quick, somebody call the Ministry of Culture or the L'Académie française or whoever’s in charge of stamping out anglicisms. We’ve got a violation here.