Dali’s Chupa Chups logo

Founded by Spaniard Enric Bernat in 1958, Chupa Chups is now owned by the Italian-Dutch multinational Perfetti Van Melle (the corporation also owns brands such as Mentos, Smint, and Fruitella). The Chupa Chups brand name comes from the Spanish verb chupar, meaning “to suck.”

In the obituary of Enric Bernat he was quoted as saying, “I saw sweets didn’t suit their main consumers, children. They got their hands sticky and ran into trouble with their parents. So I stuck a sweet on a stick.”

“In 1969, Dali was approached to design a new Chupa Chups logo, and the result became as instantly recognisable as his melting clocks. Dali incorporated the Chupa Chups name into a brightly coloured daisy shape. Always keenly aware of branding, Dali suggested that the logo be placed on top of the lolly instead of the side so that it could always be seen intact.”

Quoted from BBC’s Modern Masters: Dali, Chupa Chups logo (link removed, no longer live, unfortunately).

Its first marketing campaign was the logo with the slogan “És rodó i dura molt, Chupa Chups,” which translates from Catalan as the rather uninspiring, “It’s round and long-lasting.”

In the 1980s, an anti-smoking slogan “Smoke Chupa Chups” was tried to attract further adult consumers. The company’s current anti-smoking slogan is “Stop smoking, start sucking,” with certain packaging designed as a parody to cigarette packs. Some packages parody the mandatory black and white warning labels of the European Union with the notice “Sucking does not kill.”

Today Chupa Chups sells lollipops in more than 150 countries, in more than 100 flavours. Founder Enric Bernat is survived by his wife and five children, including Xavier, the president of Chupa Chups.

More in the Chupa Chups history.

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