Jello/Post--Hostess/Twinkies

[Zach Wheat]

Originally Posted by brian1961

Thanks, Zach, top notch reporting on your post response. Bravo, bro.

The number of cards in the 1975 Hostess Twinkies set as 60 was what I thought I recalled, but could not definitely remember. You know, if you don't mind the stains, they would be a neat set to collect. There's something special about one free prize card to a purchase product; however, with the Twinkies, you were buying a pair of the Twinkies. With the box of Hostess, you were getting a bunch of the product, and three cards. Reminds me of the Bazooka baseball and football cards of the 60s -- 1971. Their first year of 1959 is an entirely different scenario, and much more rarely seen, today.

As some know, I really love those postwar regional / food cards, coins, and premiums.

'Nuf said. Thanks again, Zach. ---Brian Powell

Hey thanks Brian, and good efforts on your book. I think the '60's & '70's era will be known as the "Age of the Regional" sets. It is surprising to me that "regionals" aren't more widely followed.

Originally Posted by darkhorse9

Actually there are four different sizes of "Twinkies" cards depending on the product it went with. The traditional size, the tall narrow ones, larger ones and larger ones with flaps.

Some of the cards can be found in more than one "size" In all cases the card itself was the same size, just the border around it differed. The exception to that was the narrow "cupcake" cards where the print on the back is noticeably smaller.

So....are we talking FOUR sets?

No just 2 sets, at least in 1975. The initial advertising for the Hostess set started on April 28, 1975 with the set being released in all likelihood a little earlier - sort of late for a baseball set. Six weeks later the Twinkies set was introduced as a "test" set in the South. Cal market. It was then that ITT decided to go national with both sets, introducing all cards to all areas. They may have had product distribution issues - but this was directly counter to what ITT initially intended. In July-ish 1975 Ray Faccenda, Regional Sales Manager for Hostess - noted that unlike the 1961-63 Post issues - they wanted all cards to be issued in all products equally. I am unclear if this actually happened - as it appears certain that some panels had to be re-configured for various products. It is probable that panels were product specific. This is probably due to the effort required to re-configure every panel to handle the unique packaging needs for some products as previously noted.

In 1975, Twinkies (1 card) could be found in a twin pack. To counter some of the earlier production issues noted - ITT coated one side of the card with wax to prevent the oil from soaking through (as well as changing 1 of the fonts as you noted)....which is why the pictures are often of poorer quality than Hostess cards....also meaning that it is incrementally more difficult to obtain a high grade Twinkie than its Hostess counterpart.

Z