A cereal box prize, also known as a cereal box toy in the UK and Ireland, is a form of

advertising Advertising is the practice and techniques employed to bring attention to a Product (business), product or Service (economics), service. Advertising aims to present a product or service in terms of utility, advantages, and qualities of int ...

that involves using a promotional toy or small item that is offered as an incentive to buy a particular

breakfast cereal Breakfast cereal is a category of food, including food products, made from food processing, processed cereal, cereal grains, that are eaten as part of breakfast or as a snack food, primarily in Western societies. Although warm, cooked cereals li ...

. Prizes are found inside or sometimes on the cereal box. The term "cereal box prize" is sometimes used as a broader term to also include premiums that can be ordered through the mail from an advertising promotion printed on the outside of the cereal box.

Distribution

Cereal box prizes and premiums have been distributed in four ways. The first, not frequently used now, was an in-store (or point-of-sale) prize that was handed to the customer with the purchase of one or more specified boxes of cereal. The second method of distribution is to include the prize in the box itself, usually outside the liner bag—often called an "in-pack promotion" in retail marketing. The third method is attaching the prize to the box - "on-pack" promotion - (as with plastic records laminated to the back of the box) or printing the prize on the box (as with numerous games and trading cards) or simply attaching the prize to the box with tape or

shrink wrap Shrink wrap, also shrink film, is a material made up of polymer plastic film. When heat is applied, it shrinks tightly over whatever it is covering. Heat can be applied with a handheld heat gun (electric or gas), or the product and film can p ...

. Some prizes include a gameboard or other interactive activity printed on the box that corresponds with the prize inside the box, which is used as a gamepiece. The fourth method of distribution is to have the consumer mail in the UPC proof-of-purchase labels cut from a specified number of boxes, sometimes with a

cheque A cheque (or check in American English) is a document that orders a bank, building society, or credit union, to pay a specific amount of money from a person's account to the person in whose name the cheque has been issued. The person writing ...

money order A money order is a directive to pay a pre-specified amount of money from prepaid funds, making it a more trusted method of payment than a cheque. History Systems similar to modern money orders can be traced back centuries. Paper documents known ...

to defray the cost of shipping, and the premium is sent to the consumer by mail (rarely first-class), usually from a third-party source.

History

W.K. Kellogg was the first to introduce prizes in boxes of cereal. The marketing strategy that he established has produced thousands of different cereal box prizes that have been distributed by the tens of billions.Kelloggs history, William Keith (W. K.) Kellogg legacy
Kellogg's Corn Flakes had the first breakfast cereal

prize A prize is an award to be given to a person or a group of people (such as sporting teams and organizations) to recognize and reward their actions and achievements.

. ''The Funny Jungleland Moving Pictures Book'' was given to customers in the stores by merchants at the time of purchase of two packages of Kellogg's Corn Flakes. In 1909, Kellogg's changed the book give-away to a premium mail-in offer for the cost of a dime. By 1912, Kellogg's had distributed 2.5 million Jungleland books. The book underwent various edition changes and was last offered to consumers in 1937. In 1945, Kellogg inserted a prize in the form of

pin-back button A pin-back button or pinback button, pin button, button badge, or simply pin-back or badge, is a button or badge that can be temporarily fastened to the surface of a garment using a safety pin, or a pin formed from wire, a clutch or other mechani ...

s into each box of Pep cereal. Pep pins have included U.S. Army squadrons as well as characters from newspaper comics. There were five series of comic characters and eighteen different buttons in each set, with a total of ninety in the collection.Good Old Days: Will Keith Kellogg
Kellogg’s 3D Baseball and Football Cards produced by Optigraphics were a big hit from 1970 to 1983 in packages of Kellogg's cereals, initially Corn Flakes and later other brands.Kellogg's 3D Baseball Cards
/ref> A popular and collectable series was Crater Critters.Hall, Craig (1998).
A Guide to Australian Breakfast Cereal Toy Premiums
'. Published by Parramatta, N.S.W. .

Technical advances

The invention of a screw

injection molding Injection moulding (U.S. spelling: injection molding) is a manufacturing process for producing parts by injecting molten material into a mould, or mold. Injection moulding can be performed with a host of materials mainly including metals (for ...

machine by American inventor James Watson Hendry in 1946 changed the world of cereal box prizes. Thermoplastics could be used to produce toys much more rapidly, and much more cheaply, because recycled plastic could be remolded using this process. In addition, injection molding for plastics required much less cool-down time for the toys, because the plastic is not completely melted before injected into the molds. Hendry also developed the first gas-assisted injection molding process in the 1970s, which permitted the production of complex, hollow prizes that cooled quickly. This greatly improved design flexibility as well as the strength and finish of manufactured parts while reducing production time, cost, weight, and waste.Injection Molding History

References

Bibliography

* {{cite book , last=Bruce, first=Scott , title=Cereal Boxes and Prizes, 1960s : A Tribute and Price Guide, year=1998, publisher=Flake World Publishing, location=Chamblee, Ga., isbn=0-9662123-0-4

External links