Skittles
It's from 1979, before you were born.
- Maker
- Mars (Mars Wrigley)
- Type
- Fruit-flavored candy
- Debuted
- 1974 (UK); 1979 (US)
- Note
- "taste the rainbow"
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About
As of 2026, it's 47 years old.
Skittles invited you to 'Taste the Rainbow,' which is a poetic way of saying 'eat a bag of tiny, intensely fruity, candy-shelled chews and then argue about which color is best.' (It's the red. People who say green are wrong, but loudly.)
Reaching the US around 1979, Skittles built one of the strangest ad campaigns ever made — surreal, often unsettling little films that have almost nothing to do with candy and somehow sell enormous amounts of it.
Chewy, tangy, and endlessly sortable, Skittles is the rare candy that doubles as a personality test based on which flavor you secretly leave in the bag.
Skittles through the years
First made in the UK
Reaches the US
Candy-shelled fruit chews in a rainbow of flavors.
"Taste the Rainbow"
The surreal campaign becomes one of advertising's most iconic.
