Midweek Blues

For Midweek Blues this week I'm going to take you back to the candy of my childhood. One of my favorite candies was the Mallo Cup. Mallo Cups are milk chocolate cups with a whipped creamy center and a sprinkle of coconut.

Another favorite was the Smoothie. The Smoothie has a center of peanut butter and is coated with butterscotch.

Inside each package of Mallo Cups and Smoothies is a cardboard piece of play money.

Each piece of play money is worth points ranging from five to fifty. Even today you can collect the points and redeem them for prizes or a rebate. Consumers have continued to save points for over 73 years and over 51/2% of play money is redeemed nationwide. The largest amount of play money redeemed by a single person was in 2006 when a gentleman from Uniontown, Ohio mailed in enough coin cards to receive a $353.00 check. He had collected over 176,000 points. Think about how much candy he ate! Better yet think about how much money he might have spent buying the candy bars.

I have twelve cards in front of me with a total of 175 points. On average I've probably spent twelve dollars obtaining those points. If I continue buying the candy at a dollar each and hope for the same point values I will on the average spend $36 per 500 points. In order to get a check for $353.00 I could very well spend over $12,000!!!!!

The Boyer site doesn't mention cash anymore; but for 500 points you can get a $1.00 rebate. Frankly, I'm waiting for a candy sale at my local store!!!!!

However, as a kid growing up I collected the cards and begged them from friends and by the end of the school year I had the 500 points to send and redeem. Back then your 500 points got you a whole box of candy. Somehow, that seemed worth it!

Some days that whipped creme center is still exactly what I crave!

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