Here’s an atrocious marketing gaffe. I bought this Friendly’s Chocolate Marshmallow Swirl ice cream with the idea that there would be giant swirls of marshmallow in it.

Where would I get that idea?

I was dismayed to find this inside:

No, I was dismayed by what I didn’t find inside.

Where’s the marshmallow!? Where are the giant gobs of heavenly marshmallow that the package portrayed? If you look carefully, you can see some very thin swirls in there. I enlarged a section of it that appears in the above photo on the right.

This makes me wonder: Has it always been this way or is it a sign of the hard economic times? Did Friendly’s used to have a utopia of marshmallowy goodness that’s depleted with their budget? Or have they always gotten away with lying on the box? Or was my carton of ice cream a fluke?

Although the packaging convinced me to buy the product, I was deceived into buying a product I didn’t want. Granted, chocolate ice cream with a tinge of marshmallow is still delicious and won’t go to waste, but I was craving some serious marshmallow.

Not only will I not buy this product again – unless Friendly’s can convince me they’ve changed their ways – but I won’t be able to trust any Friendly’s packaging in the future.

And an added negative effect of this false advertising is that I’m outing them on the Internet – to my multitude of devoted fans (aka Kristyn LeBlanc – but she’s fierce) no less!