It’s the first month of a new year, so when you head to the supermarket you know you’ll be bombarded with promotions to help you eat better.
But one place you might not expect to see this sort of messaging is in the crisp aisle, however you might notice a bizarre change being made to certain packets of your favourites over the next few weeks.
That’s because Walkers has added a special claim to packs of its better-for-you crisps and snacks, which highlights that they contain 0.0% alcohol – just in case you weren’t already aware they aren’t made with any booze.
This will feature on packets of Walkers Baked crisps, Walkers Less Salt, Snack a Jacks, Pop Works and SunBites.
As well as the change to the packets, there’s also a brand new cheeky advert which sees Danny Dyer behind the bar in a pub, serving up crisps in a pint glass to customers who are ‘going dry’.
The new campaign, launched by Walkers parent company PepsiCo, is intended to be ‘reminiscent of beer adverts’ during Dry January.
‘Some people say January is the Monday of months, but maybe they don’t know that you can go dry and still enjoy every moment with alcohol-free snacks – the perfect January choice ,’ Danny tells viewers in the ad.
‘Wanna share a laugh with friends? Or tears? Or you don’t have any friends… perfect. Tough day? Have a not necessarily cold one,’ he continues as he plops a giant ice bucket full of crisps down in front of a group.
At the end of the ad, a baffled woman says to him: ‘Sorry, but snacks have never had any alcohol?’ To which he replies: ‘Neither have they ever been advertised like this in January.’
He then proceeds to ‘drink’ the crisps from the glass.
Speaking about the change, said PepsiCo UK marketing director Cynthia Finke told The Grocer: ‘Many shoppers will start the new year off by cutting back on the things they enjoy, such as some of their favourite snacks.
‘Through this, we can remind consumers of our broad range of great-tasting non-HFSS snacks, making sticking to good intentions a little easier with brands they already know and love.’
This comes after Walkers faced backlash at Christmas from shoppers over their advent calendar.
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People couldn’t decide if they thought the product, which contained 24 packs of crisps, was ‘stupid’ or ‘a dream’.
This was because of the £10 price tag, which many people pointed out cost much more than it usually would to purchase 24 bags of crisps.
On TikTok people were also taken aback by the price, with Katie Sherred saying: ‘Cheaper to buy the 24 crisps in multipacks! You’re paying for the box!’
But @christmascountdownuk wasn’t bothered by the cost, proclaiming: ‘My prayers have finally been answered with this crisps advent calendar!!!’
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