The British grocery retailer Waitrose withdrew a set of chocolate Easter ducks — buyers considered this set racist and were discussing the fact in social networks.
In the set there were three chocolate ducklings signed as "crackling" (crispy), "fluffy" and "disgusting" (ugly). The first two were made from white and milk chocolate and the ugly one - from bitter chocolate.
These inscriptions seemed offensive. "It is wrong", "There are thousands of other words why "disgusting" and "ugly"?" — such messages appeared on Twitter. However, many consumers did not see anything racist in chocolate ducklings: "Please, leave this planet if you are pathetic to find such things offensive!", "The fact that you see racism in chocolate forces me to think that a problem is in you", "Real crime here — 8 pounds for a chocolate duck".
Despite it, the retail chain Waitrose apologized to buyers and has renewed the packing. After "redesign" set appeared again in shops and online.
The Daily Telegraph reads, with the inscription ugly the producer wanted to draw a parallel with the fairy tale by Hans Christian Anderson "The Ugly Duckling". "It is a pity that the name of a product has upset someone, we had no intention to offend" — the representative of Waitrose company reported.
