The Mulino Bianco Surprises are back: the nostalgia operation for the generation of the 1980s

We are not so sure that today’s children know what a matchbox is. Certainly though in 1983, when the Mulino Bianco Sorpresine were launched, in every kitchen there was at least one. Automatic gas ignition was a futuristic thing, not to mention induction hobs. So mothers (no need to make fun of us, in the 1980s family roles were still mostly defined on the basis of gender) often used matches to start cooking.

If it seems like a little time has passed, good for you. In reality, forty years have passed, and we wouldn’t want to be the ones to bring you back to the harsh reality. Times have changed (partly fortunately, starting with the definition of family roles above), and if we think back to the glorious Eighties sometimes it sounds so sweet (it is for a good percentage of Italians, according to an opinion poll by AstraRicerche on behalf of Mulino Bianco) it is certainly the responsibility of «Canaglia Nostalgia». He knows it well Mulino Bianco, in fact, which always plays convincingly with the nostalgia effect, this time with an operation that makes an entire generation smile: forty years after their first appearance on the market, the Mulino Bianco Sorpresine are back, those little boxes with the house that we all wanted to have imprinted on them and inside a toy to unwrap as a reward.

The new surprises

An object-icon like few others, at least for the children of yesteryear: 75% of Italians have collected them, almost all (94.7%) know them, and one in two still has at least one at home. According to data collected by AstraRicerche, they were the object that all children wanted, even more than the Commodore 64, Walkman or cassette tapes. Strange times, the eighties, perhaps really made of simpler things.

Then there were more surprises in the little surprises 650 different games, for a total of four million pieces produced every week: marbles, stickers, game of the goose, flea game, cards, scoubidou, crayons. But above all, there were the erasers, which apparently clearly detached the preferences of the children of that periodor. And it is evidently to them that Mulino Bianco addresses itself with today’s Little Surprises, re-proposing a new collection of eighteen different erasers, reproducing bees, flowers and the miniatures of the packaging of breakfast products. Always, of course, inside the iconic matchbox. Unlike in the past, the Little Surprises will not be found in snack packs, but can be received directly at home with a collection of points, and this is also a blast from the past, when next to the matchbox, in the kitchen, there is it was always also a container for the stamps cut from the packs.

The breakfast boxes

Among the latest news from Mulino Bianco, in addition to the return of the Sorpresine, there are also the breakfast boxes available on the site Dedicated to you, the Barilla Group e-commerce platform that allows you to create and purchase customized product packaging. There is, for example, the one with the Baiocchi, the Cri Cri Leones and four colorful coffee cups or the one dedicated to good humour, with the Batticuori, a glass cup and a Happiness-themed placemat, or even the one to give to lovers of simple and natural breakfast, with Rigoli, a jar of honey and eco-sustainable placemats inspired by bees.