Necco Wafers are a candy

Candy

Candy, specifically sugar candy, is a confection made from a concentrated solution of sugar in water, to which flavorings and colorants are added...

 wafer made by the United States-based New England Confectionery Company (Necco

NECCO

Necco , pronounced "neck-o", is the acronym for the New England Confectionery Company, a manufacturer of candy. It was created in 1901 by the merger of several small confectionery companies located in the Greater Boston area; since December 2007 Necco has been owned by American Capital.The company...

). Necco Wafers were first produced in 1847 and are considered by Necco to be its core product. Each roll of Necco Wafers contains eight flavors: lemon

Lemon

The lemon is both a small evergreen tree native to Asia, and the tree's ellipsoidal yellow fruit. The fruit is used for culinary and non-culinary purposes throughout the world – primarily for its juice, though the pulp and rind are also used, mainly in cooking and baking...

 (yellow), lime

Lime (fruit)

Lime is a term referring to a number of different citrus fruits, both species and hybrids, which are typically round, green to yellow in color, 3–6 cm in diameter, and containing sour and acidic pulp. Limes are a good source of vitamin C. Limes are often used to accent the flavors of foods and...

 (green), orange

Orange (fruit)

An orange—specifically, the sweet orange—is the citrus Citrus × sinensis and its fruit. It is the most commonly grown tree fruit in the world....

 (orange), clove

Clove

Cloves are the aromatic dried flower buds of a tree in the family Myrtaceae. Cloves are native to the Maluku islands in Indonesia and used as a spice in cuisines all over the world...

 (purple), cinnamon

Cinnamon

Cinnamon is a spice obtained from the inner bark of several trees from the genus Cinnamomum that is used in both sweet and savoury foods...

 (white), wintergreen

Methyl salicylate

Methyl salicylate is a natural product of many species of plants. Some of the plants which produce it are called wintergreens, hence the common name.-Botanical background:...

 (pink), licorice (black), and chocolate

Chocolate

Chocolate is a raw or processed food produced from the seed of the tropical Theobroma cacao tree. Cacao has been cultivated for at least three millennia in Mexico, Central and South America. Its earliest documented use is around 1100 BC...

 (brown). The ingredients in Necco Wafers are sugar

Sugar

Sugar is a class of edible crystalline carbohydrates, mainly sucrose, lactose, and fructose, characterized by a sweet flavor.Sucrose in its refined form primarily comes from sugar cane and sugar beet...

, corn syrup

Corn syrup

Corn syrup is a food syrup, which is made from the starch of maize and contains varying amounts of maltose and higher oligosaccharides, depending on the grade. Corn syrup is used in foods to soften texture, add volume, prevent crystallization of sugar, and enhance flavor...

, gelatin

Gelatin

Gelatin is a translucent, colorless, brittle , flavorless solid substance, derived from the collagen inside animals' skin and bones. It is commonly used as a gelling agent in food, pharmaceuticals, photography, and cosmetic manufacturing. Substances containing gelatin or functioning in a similar...

 (an animal by-product), gums, colorings, and flavorings..

History

Necco Wafers date back to 1847. Oliver Chase, an English immigrant, invented a lozenge cutting machine with which he produced the wafers. At the time of the Civil War, these were called "hub wafers" and were carried by Union soldiers. In 1901, Chase and Company merged with two other companies to incorporate the New England Confectionery Company. By 1912 the wafers were being advertised as "Necco Wafers", a name they still carry today.

During World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

 the United States government ordered Necco to produce its wafers for soldiers overseas. As a result of this action, Necco saw its sales of the wafers peak. Upon returning home, many former soldiers became faithful customers who continued to buy the wafers.

Changes in formula

In 2009, Necco changed the formula for its Necco Wafers. Artificial colors and flavors were eliminated. The candy was made softer through the addition of glycerine. The lime flavor was removed due to difficulties in creating an all-natural green coloring, resulting in a 7-flavor Necco Wafer roll.

According to Jackie Hague, Necco's vice president of marketing, switching to all-natural flavors and colors "would draw young mothers concerned about their children's diet." The new cinnamon flavor is "less like Red Hots", the new lemon, "less like paper candy dots

Candy Buttons

Candy Buttons, Candy Dots, or Pox are small rounded pegs of candy that are attached to a strip of paper. This classic sugar candy was originally introduced by the Cumberland Valley company. Necco acquired the brand in 1980, which made them the exclusive manufacturer of this product in the United...

 and more like lemon meringue pie

Lemon meringue pie

Lemon meringue pie is a type of baked pie, usually served for dessert, made with a crust usually made of shortcrust or shortbread pastry, lemon curd filling and a fluffy meringue topping. Lemon meringue pie is typically prepared with a bottom pie crust, but with no upper crust: i.e. the meringue is...

 filling." The chocolate flavor—previously a vanilla

Vanilla

Vanilla is a flavoring derived from orchids of the genus Vanilla, primarily from the Mexican species, Flat-leaved Vanilla . The word vanilla derives from the Spanish word "", little pod...

 flavor "with a hint of chocolate flavoring"—switches to a more intense all-cocoa

Cocoa solids

Cocoa solids are the low-fat component of chocolate. When sold as an end product, it may also be called cocoa powder, cocoa, and cacao....

 flavor. The traditional eighth Necco flavor, lime

Lime (fruit)

Lime is a term referring to a number of different citrus fruits, both species and hybrids, which are typically round, green to yellow in color, 3–6 cm in diameter, and containing sour and acidic pulp. Limes are a good source of vitamin C. Limes are often used to accent the flavors of foods and...

 (green), was dropped in the move to all-natural flavors. In addition, the Necco Chocolate assortment changed from 100% of the standard Necco chocolate wafers into a four-flavor chocolate assortment.

However, the change was not popular with long-time customers. The company received "stacks and stacks of letters and e-mails that said, 'Why did you do this? You ruined it,'" according to vice president of sales Steve Ornell. Less than two years after the change, sales of Necco Wafers had fallen by 35 percent. In response to these concerns, Necco Wafer production switched back to the original formula in the summer of 2011.

Other Varieties

The Necco Chocolate assortment is a four-flavor assortment, containing: mocha

Cafe Mocha

A caffè mocha or café mochaAs elsewhere in coffee naming, the Italian caffè and French café are commonly found, as are the hyperforeignisms caffé and cafè, which confuse the accents. Also, in Italian, the correct spelling is Moka, used both for the city and the Moka pot. "Mocha", by contrast, is...

 (light brown), white chocolate

White chocolate

White chocolate is a confectionery derivative of chocolate. It commonly consists of cocoa butter, sugar, milk solids and salt, and is characterized by a pale yellow or ivory appearance...

 (white), milk chocolate (brown), and dark chocolate (dark brown).

Necco Smoothies are the latest addition to the Necco Wafer line, and come in blueberry

Blueberry

Blueberries are flowering plants of the genus Vaccinium with dark-blue berries and are perennial...

 (pale blue), banana

Banana

Banana is the common name for herbaceous plants of the genus Musa and for the fruit they produce. Bananas come in a variety of sizes and colors when ripe, including yellow, purple, and red....

 caramel

Caramel

Caramel is a beige to dark-brown confection made by heating any of a variety of sugars. It is used as a flavoring in puddings and desserts, as a filling in bonbons, and as a topping for ice cream, custard and coffee....

 (yellow), tropical pineapple

Pineapple

Pineapple is the common name for a tropical plant and its edible fruit, which is actually a multiple fruit consisting of coalesced berries. It was given the name pineapple due to its resemblance to a pine cone. The pineapple is by far the most economically important plant in the Bromeliaceae...

/coconut

Coconut

The coconut palm, Cocos nucifera, is a member of the family Arecaceae . It is the only accepted species in the genus Cocos. The term coconut can refer to the entire coconut palm, the seed, or the fruit, which is not a botanical nut. The spelling cocoanut is an old-fashioned form of the word...

 (white), peach

Peach

The peach tree is a deciduous tree growing to tall and 6 in. in diameter, belonging to the subfamily Prunoideae of the family Rosaceae. It bears an edible juicy fruit called a peach...

 (orange), and strawberry

Strawberry

Fragaria is a genus of flowering plants in the rose family, Rosaceae, commonly known as strawberries for their edible fruits. Although it is commonly thought that strawberries get their name from straw being used as a mulch in cultivating the plants, the etymology of the word is uncertain. There...

creme (pink).