cheezels in a box

I Tried To Find Out Why Cheezels Come In A Box, And Nearly Lost My Mind

Tell us you love Punkee without telling us you love Punkee. Sign up to our newsletter, and follow us on Instagram and Twitter. It'll mean the world.

Being ghosted by a box of chips wasn’t one of my plans for 2020, but here we are.

I can’t remember exactly when or why the question, “Why do Cheezels come in a box?” first materialised in my mind, but at some point during Melbourne’s four-month lockdown it did. It has stayed there ever since, eating away at the last crumbs of my sanity in the box of my brain.

Growing up in New Zealand, the cheesy rings came in a bag like every other chip — outside of Pringles, of course, which are famously canned. After checking with a confused friend back home who was given no context, I can confirm Cheezels are still sold in a bag there. Desperate for answers and armed with a constant need to distract myself from the monotonous boredom of 2020, I found myself falling down the rabbit hole to this: my rock bottom.

Where do I begin?

The first hurdle I ran into on my quest for an answer was Siri who, after hearing my Kiwi accent say ‘Cheezels’, sent me here. Reverting back to the old-fashioned way of Googling, I became aware of two things: First, there was absolutely no information about why Australian Cheezels come in a box and, secondly, it appears that no one else seems to have asked this question. 

Feeling both confused and disillusioned, something inside told me to keep going. I asked my friends and housemates their thoughts, and was mainly met with confusion, mild interest, and a lot of concern for my mental wellbeing. 

“Why won’t you talk to me?”

My next step was to reach out to Cheezels directly. I contacted their distributors, Snack Brands Australia, as well as the Cheezels Facebook page, but received no response. I also discovered that Snack Brands Australia’s Twitter is set to private… What were they hiding? What didn’t they want me to know?

Even as Melbourne slowly started to come out of lockdown and a mild sense of normality returned, I still couldn’t accept defeat. It had been over a week since my third failed attempt at making contact with Cheezels, and still I’d heard nothing. Every time I went to the supermarket I could feel the boxes of chips staring back at me from the shelves. I’d had enough — as had my friends, and the staff at the coffee shop around the corner who were all desperate for me to find something else to talk about.

Wearing my heart on my sleeve, I messaged Cheezels again, and this time they responded. An email from SBA’s marketing manager confirmed they were ready to talk and answer any questions. Trembling with anticipation I sent a reply, outlining that I had but one single question: Why do Cheezels come in a box in Australia?

Their response was almost instant, as was my disappointment upon reading. “Cheezels have come in a box for a long time,” the email began.

“The box is really part of the nostalgia/heritage of the brand. They also display nicely on the shelf.” The email then explained that other brands of chips are available in boxes – though the examples given all referenced multi-packs, which in my opinion don’t count.

So… what now?

What I thought would bring me peace had ended up sending my mind into overdrive. After all that time, a two-sentence explanation was simply not enough. There had to be more to it. For instance, if it’s part of the “nostalgia/heritage” of Cheezels, why don’t they come in a box anywhere else? If they display nicely in a box, why don’t they package other chips like that too?

I emailed back, desperately hoping there was more information that would give me closure, but at the time of writing I have heard nothing more. My attempts to contact Bluebird — the owners of Cheezels in New Zealand — were also met with silence, which left me back to where I started, but more confused and with more questions.

There comes a moment in every person’s life where they know they must admit defeat. For me that moment was the other day, sitting on my bed asking myself, “Did I get ghosted by a box of chips?” 

In that moment of realisation I accepted I would probably never find out the truth. Many months and multiple tax-deductible boxes of the cheesy rings since I first fell down that orange-dusted rabbit hole, it was over.

As I dusted off my fingers and cleared the crumbs from my mind, a wave of relief washed over me and I started to wonder: why DO Pringles come in a can?