M&M's Pausing Using Spokescandies, Replacing With Maya Rudolph

By Russ Burlingame

After backlash to some minor brand changes over the past year, M&M Mars has decided to temporarily retire its M&Ms "spokescandies," and will replace them with an ad campaign fronted by Saturday Night Live veteran Maya Rudolph. After making some minor design changes to the Green M&M, the company also introduced a purple M&M "spokescandy" last year, followed by an all-female packaging promotion earlier this month. Of course, given the timing, it's easy to assume that Rudolph's first appearance in an M&Ms ad will be a Super Bowl commercial next month. 

Even if that's true, it's hard to guess whether that means the whole thing is a joke, or if they really are pausing the use of the candies. We'll have to see what comes next.

"America, let's talk. In the last year, we've made some changes to our beloved spokescandies. We weren't sure if anyone would even notice. And we definitely didn't think it would break the internet. But now we get it -- even a candy's shoes can be polarizing. Which was the last things M&M's wanted, since we're all about bringing people together," the brand said in a statement posted to social media. "Therefore, we hvae decided to take an indefinite pause from the spokescandies. In their place, we are proud to introduce a new spokesperson America can agree on: the beloved Maya Rudolph. We are confident Ms. Rudolph will champion the power of fun to create a world where everyone feels they belong."

You can see the tweet below.

Along with the debut of Purple in September, a song called "I'm Just Gonna Be Me" was released to on all major music streaming platforms. For every stream of the song, M&M's pledged $1 (up to five hundred thousand dollars) will be made to Sing for Hope, a non-profit that harnesses the power of the arts to bring hope, connection, and purpose to millions of people around the world through music. The charitable aspect of Purple's debut is a part of M&M's FUNd, the brand's global initiative intended to track the brand's impact on its mission to increase a sense of belonging for ten million people by 2025. They did a virtually identical promotion with the all-female packaging, donating money to women's causes via partnerships with She Is the Music and We are Moving the Needle.

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