Retro Sweets by Decade: What You Actually Remember

“Retro” usually means whatever was in the corner shop when you were eight. Here is roughly what belongs to when, and — more usefully — which of them actually still taste the way you remember.

Pre-1960s: the survivors

Many of the oldest sweets are the least changed. Pontefract cakes go back to the seventeenth century in some form. Aniseed balls, mint imperials, humbugs, rhubarb and custard, pear drops and sherbet lemons are all Victorian or Edwardian. Hard boiled sweets are essentially sugar, glucose and flavouring, and there has been little reason to reformulate them.

1960s–70s

Fruit salads and blackjacks (1920s in origin but their heyday here), Drumstick lollies (1957), Refreshers, Parma Violets, flying saucers, sherbet fountains, cola cubes and kola kubes. This is the core of what most people mean by retro sweets, and it is the era our retro range leans on hardest.

1980s–90s

Wham bars, Dip Dabs, candy sticks (previously sold as candy cigarettes, renamed in the 1980s), Millions (1990s), foam bananas and shrimps, jazzles. The era of the 10p mix-up bag.

What actually changed: the colours

This is why some sweets look wrong to people returning to them. In 2007 a study at the University of Southampton linked six artificial colours to increased hyperactivity in some children. Products still using them must carry the warning that they “may have an adverse effect on activity and attention in children”, and rather than print that, most manufacturers reformulated to natural colours.

Natural colours are less intense and less stable. That is the whole reason a sweet you remember as violently red is now a softer pink. The flavour is usually unchanged — it is your eyes noticing, not your tongue.

Where a product we sell still carries that warning, we publish it on the product page as a separate advisory rather than leaving it buried in the ingredient list.

What else changed

• Sugar taxes and reformulation have reduced sugar in some lines, which changes texture as much as sweetness.
• Gelatine has been swapped for starch or pectin in a number of jelly sweets, which makes them firmer and less bouncy — and, incidentally, suitable for vegetarians where they were not.
• Portion sizes shrank. This one is not nostalgia; many bars and bags are genuinely smaller than they were.

The ones that are actually gone

Some really have been discontinued rather than reformulated, and no amount of searching will turn them up. Others are still made under a different name or by a different manufacturer. If you are hunting something specific, email sa***@********ts.com with whatever you remember — the shape, the colour, roughly when. We have been doing this since 2014, we can usually identify it, and we will tell you honestly if it no longer exists rather than selling you the nearest thing and hoping.

Why they do not taste like you remember

Sometimes this is nostalgia doing what nostalgia does. Often it is not, and the sweet genuinely
did change. There are four reasons, and they are worth separating.

Colours were withdrawn. This is the biggest one. A number of synthetic colours
were restricted or made subject to a mandatory warning in the UK and EU, and rather than carry a
label saying a product “may have an adverse effect on activity and attention in
children”, most manufacturers reformulated. Plant-derived colours behave differently, and
they do not always taste of nothing.

Sugar was reduced or replaced. Reformulation for health targets and for cost has
changed a lot of recipes quietly.

Your palate changed. Genuinely. Children have more taste buds and a much higher
tolerance for sweetness. Something that was perfect at eight can be cloying at forty.

Portion size changed. A lot of “they used to be bigger” is
correct, and it is the most reliably accurate of the four memories.

Renamed rather than discontinued

A surprising number of “they stopped making it” conversations end with the sweet
sitting on the shelf under a different name. Brands change hands, and the new owner rationalises
the range or re-badges to fit an existing family. If you can describe the shape, the texture and
roughly when you last had it, there is a fair chance we can identify it.

What has genuinely gone

Some things really have stopped. When a manufacturer ends a line, no sweet shop can get it —
we cannot conjure stock that is not being produced, and anyone telling you otherwise is selling
you a substitute. We would rather say so.

The honest position on “can you get me…” is: ask, and we will tell you which
of the four cases it is.

Traditional does not mean old

Worth saying plainly. The traditional lines we sell are currently manufactured
products, weighed and sealed when you order them. “Retro” describes the recipe
and the era it belongs to, not the age of what is in the bag.

Every one carries a full ingredient declaration and allergen statement on its product page,
which is something the original packaging conspicuously did not. If you are avoiding gluten, note
that traditional liquorice is bound with wheat flour — see
which sweets are gluten free.

Where to look

Retro and traditional sweets is the main range,
but a lot of what people are remembering lives in
boiled sweets — pear drops, rhubarb and custard, cough
candy — and in sherbet.
Spanish is where the traditional liquorice is.