Holiday 2002 Pt. II: Pet Pals

Our favorite Smackersville Pet Pals were ready to take us on a snow-filled adventure when they arrived for Holiday 2002. All bundled up in their coziest snow gear and ready to gallivant through the snowiest slopes with 6 brand new flavors to cozy up to!

I actually picked up my back up tin at a Bonne Bell warehouse sale years back and realized after that someone on the BB team wrote "Canada 2002?" on the back of the tin sleeve. Confirming this was both US and Canada 😊. How cute is the comic strip featuring Smackersville's very own Candy Confetti and Moon Rock Candy!? It appears to be the start of the comic strip story of how their fur friends Cupcake and Starberry made their way out on a snowy fun-filled day.

Holiday 2002 Pet Pals:

Arctic's Ice Cream

Starberry's Strawberry

Sugar's Snowball

Cupcake's Snow Angel

Kiwi's Watermelon Slush

Muffin's Merry Berry

Arctic's Ice Cream- Arctic always brought us some kind of amazing mint. This was like a cool peppermint stick ice cream flavor from the coziest small town ice cream parlor. It even gave lips a slightly rosy-reddish tint like the color of a cold winter day nipping at your lips.

Starberry's Strawberry- Always confused for strawberry, Starberry finally got their own strawberry flavor! This fruit-juicy strawberry was actually similar to Fantastical Strawberry without the punch. I'd liken this to a strawberry popsicle flavor.

Sugar's Snowball- Was definitely a merry maple treat. I wouldn't call this a snowball cookie flavor that we saw from BB before this but something unexpectedly sweet. Especially since the last maple flavor BB created was Maple Nut from Holiday 1977, 25 years before this, made this a welcome surprise and the pink tube made it even more unsuspecting. If you ask me this is a maple sugar icing flavor that is so merry and sweet.

Cupcake's Snow Angel- This ambiguously named treat was like a fresh baked, tasty vanilla cupcake. I imagined Cupcake the cat diving into a pile of powdered sugar snow and making snow angels while her owner Candy Confetti was inside baking vanilla cupcakes in the kitchen.

Kiwi's Watermelon Slush- Watermelon proved to be a year round staple in Smackersville. This was a new freshly juiced watermelon kiwi slush flavor that fit in nicely with the icy snow theme. BB always did the absolute best fruit fusion blends long before anyone thought of doing them.

Muffin's Merry Berry- Muffin gave us this sweetened snowy berry that had no distinct gourmand or bakery notes so the flavor was a bit of a mystery. By the name I thought it could possibly be a welcomed return of Holiday 1998's Merry Berry but after first popping off the cap, it was noticeably a brand new flavor. This was also the only one in the bunch with a shimmery gleam.

The labels on each tube were colorful and had micro glitter graphics that sparkled like freshly fallen snow. The glitter detail was much smaller than say the Cosmic labels, so it was awesome to see Bonne Bell continue to create fun and creative labels. Each Pet Pal is bundled up in their cutest snow gear; scarves, hats, mittens and all as they look to be dashing on their merry way for snow much fun ahead!

We got another collectible Pet Pals tin to go with the snow day theme to house these amazing new flavors in. The animated comic strip on the tin featuring Starberry the husky and Cupcake the cat was even featured in the Holiday 2002 ad although the actual collection was not shown (a reason why it was always crucial to pay attention to details from BB 😉). They were also featured on the lid of the tin cozied up to a new Pet Pal, Moose, who we'd officially meet the following Holiday.

 While the tins were a new icon, this collection also came in trio canes with special edition Pet Pals toppers. Check out the newspaper snippet of the trio canes here.

 

The graphics were so adorable and told the sweetest story of friends coming together to cheer each other up and keep one another company. 

"A sled with one is not as much fun...but a sled with two chases away the blues!"

The was the 2nd official Holiday Pet Pals collection and brought so much joy to Bonne Bell's already highly anticipated holiday collections. Be sure to check out Part 1 of Holiday 2002 and be on the look out for the Part 3 as we continue to look back and celebrate 20 years of incredible flavors and fun. We'll be dreaming away and stargazing in the next post for Holiday 2002. 🌟