Penguin pulls ‘insensitive’ wrapping

Penguin, the McVitie’s children’s biscuit brand, has halted production of some of its bars, because the packaging design had chilling overtones of the World Trade Center disaster.

The chocolate biscuit was carrying a picture of a penguin at the Empire State building with two planes in the distance, mimicking the film “King Kong”.

The design was rolled out at the beginning of the year, as part of a series of 28 different scenes involving the penguin character. The designs were created by Lawson Mardon Packaging Flexibles.

A spokesman says there have been no customer complaints and it was spotted by one of Penguin’s brand team.

However, the change could be costly, as the company will have to change its manufacturing process.

A spokeswoman says: “Although this is a fairly tenuous link, McVitie’s has decided to cease production of this one design immediately. This is a fairly intricate process but one that McVitie’s has been unquestionably willing to resolve. The manufacturing rolls, which package the bars, will have to be changed, but there will be no product recall.”

Penguin, famous for it P..P..PPick up a Penguin strapline, is known for it humorous advertising and has been in existence for 70 years. Creative work and advertising is done by Publicis, with media by Starcom Motive.