Freebies in Breakfast Cereals in the 80's & 90's

jacknife

While doing the shopping i noticed, that there are no freebies or anything interesting on offer with breakfast cereals anymore, i know this has been the thing for the past number of years.

In the 80's there was the wheatbix men, i remember collecting flash gordon cards and there was a sports pack you could send away for

I also remember animal heads you cut out from the back of the packs and put together

a rice crispies radio you had to collect tokens for

other plastic figures from block buster movies at the time.

Anyone else care to add their memories

lord lucan

I used to have loads of the Kellogs die-cast vans/cars etc. Must have had my parents hearts broke!!

Willow in the Kellogs cornflakes was another that still lingers in the memory.

C.K Dexter Haven

Rice Krispie bowls I remember; also a Kellogs van; lots of cheap plastic toys and a Wham record from early 80s

zoobizoo

Think the Wham record came with Rive Krispies. There were four discs with four different songs by different artists on each one. Paul Young's "living in the live of the common people" was one of the tracks.

Rice Krispies had the Mini Magne thatbyou had to send away for .

The animal heads were on the backs of Kellogg's boxes.

weetabix, before the weetabix men, had cut outs of old cars on their packs.

C.K Dexter Haven

zoobizoo wrote: »

Think the Wham record came with Rive Krispies. There were four discs with four different songs by different artists on each one. Paul Young's "living in the live of the common people" was one of the tracks.

Rice Krispies had the Mini Magne thatbyou had to send away for .

The animal heads were on the backs of Kellogg's boxes.

weetabix, before the weetabix men, had cut outs of old cars on their packs.

Were they tapes or records? You're bang on with the Paul Young track- the Wham track was Club Tropicana.

Ruu

Bike reflectors from corn flakes were the big ones.

Valentina

I remember those animal heads from the back of the packs too. A few years ago I was clearing some overgrowth from the back of the garden and found one of those heads in very good condition :P

I also remember the Kellogg's reflectors (had loads on my bike wheels!), cereal bowls, toy cars, pencil toppers and Puppy in my Pocket

L1011

The toy cards with the tokens for a cardboard cutout Brooklands race track was one I remember well. Was also a Weetabix lego house once, probably the best of the lot.

Del.Monte

Sadly I'm old enough to remember these figures from the 1960's. As usual some of the figures were impossible to find - great way of selling more cornflakes.



http://robinhoodoutlaw.blogspot.ie/2009/06/kelloggs-robin-hood-figures-c1960.html

jacknife

yes I remember the records you could send away for, the Willow characters,

who remembers the boats you filled with baking soda and put in water

heres a link to some more http://www.dailyedge.ie/cereal-box-toys-nostalgia-646559-Oct2012/#slide-slideshow11

mccard

Ruu wrote: »

Bike reflectors from corn flakes were the big ones.

darkdubh

Those hologram cards with Cornflakes,mid 80s where the card showed animals like a tiger,Rhino etc and when you tilted it became a dinosaur.

orthsquel

bike reflectors, those hologram cards (they were World Wildlife Fund cards from what I can remember, you know I actually might have some of them hidden away in a box!) and I'm sure there must have been stuff in there for any World Cup! I do remember bits not really associated with anything that were just in there..... as well as the cars, the Kelloggs vans and I have a Tony the Tiger car too.

We still have much of the different generations of bowls from Kelloggs both ceramic and plastic, some just aren't used anymore as down to the last few... but my dad is collecting all the tokens now for the new plastic bowls they've had out (ordinary bowls and the tip and sip bowls), as well as the spoons, so they have made a comeback in collecting tokens / codes and sending away for stuff.

On the subject though, I have, and always have had, although I've no idea how I came to have it and wonder does anyone else still have them or know how you got them? The Kellogg's Soft Toy Book Tony with Friends from 1984? It's a pattern book to make soft toys of Coco Monkey, Snap Crackle and Pop, Tony the Tiger and the Cornflakes Cockerel It looks like this





I also do or used to have 2 of 3 items in here, i.e. the magazine top secret even with the red de coder thing and the book, does anyone remember those?




I seem to recall all these too after looking at google images

There were what from google image result is Fantasy Toy Soldiers (I've tried to embed and resize but keeps giving me a massive pic so I'll link it instead)

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-PEWook400Nw/VAu-bRfHlvI/AAAAAAAACxo/s1i2XIJwBJg/s1600/DSC_0371.JPG


and these plastic Snap, Crackle and Pop which tbh have creepy faces from some image over haul in the 90s

http://img2.thejournal.ie/inline/651275/original/?width=605

and these.... the stuff you used to get like this to put together!

darkdubh

And the airliner models that came with Kellogs Cornflakes.I collected most of these apart from maybe the Lockheed which proved elusive.

http://cerealoffers.com/Kelloggs/Cornflakes/1980s/Airliner_Model_Kit/airliner_model_kit.html

ComfortKid

Rice Krispy bowls.. 3d glasses.. A kellogs cock reflector that you attach to the spokes of a bicycle wheel..

I was only thinking about these recently, good times! You get nothing for nothing these days.

The Mulk

zoobizoo wrote: »

Think the Wham record came with Rive Krispies. There were four discs with four different songs by different artists on each one. Paul Young's "living in the live of the common people" was one of the tracks.

Rice Krispies had the Mini Magne thatbyou had to send away for .

The animal heads were on the backs of Kellogg's boxes.

weetabix, before the weetabix men, had cut outs of old cars on their packs.

Yeah i had one with Doctor Doctor by the Thompson Twins.
there was 4 songs on each tape as said above, I think each character had their own tape
http://aurallyyours.blogspot.ie/2012/07/weetabix-top-trax-top-trax-ii-various.html

I remember the willow stuff in Cornflakes too
http://cerealoffers.com/Kelloggs/Cornflakes/1986/Willow_Figure_Scene/willow_figure_scene.html

Mad Martigan was the hardest to get:pac:

rubadub

I had the weetabix tapes, used to use them to copy spectrum games as most songs were crap.

Got frosties playing cards, there were magic tricks too.


Think you had to tape a sterling 50p to card and send it off with tokens, and it could be hard to get your hands on UK coins. Delivery was always "allow 28 days" which was an eternity as a kid.

This star wars figure was with one, I remember being disappointed as it came in a plain small cardboard box rather than commercial packing. Probably would have been worth a fortune if never opened, maybe more than a proper commercial one. The figure was pretty crap so I doubt anybody bought them, maybe they off loaded them to the cereal company.



It is even on a list of the 16 worst star wars figures
http://io9.com/the-16-most-useless-star-wars-figures-in-the-galaxy-1467580491

1) Rancor Keeper

Let's begin with one of the most absurd choices in Star Wars action figure history. The Rancor Keeper, whose name we know is Malakilli thanks to his figure, was actually offered back in the '80s in the Return of the Jedi line. This means that even in 1983, toymakers thought kids were genuinely looking forward to playingt with an obese, shirtless man whose sole scene in RotJ featured him weeping like a baby. Madness.

This might have been another, not certain but I remember having it and thinking it was crap, so I would not have asked for it or bought it myself, might have been a present though. I don't think I knew I was getting the fat lad figure i.e. the offer might have been for some random figure.


Had this koala for certain, others ring a bell

endacl

ComfortKid wrote: »

Rice Krispy bowls.. 3d glasses.. A kellogs cock reflector that you attach to the spokes of a bicycle wheel..

I was only thinking about these recently, good times! You get nothing for nothing these days.

:eek:

C.K Dexter Haven

endacl wrote: »

:eek:

now you're just rude:(
:p:p:p:p

Ruu

Pencil toppers from Rice Krispies, these I remember.

Butters1979

darkdubh wrote: »

Those hologram cards with Cornflakes,mid 80s where the card showed animals like a tiger,Rhino etc and when you tilted it became a dinosaur.

They were fantastic. Can't find a photo of them anywhere.

rubadub

Butters1979 wrote: »

They were fantastic. Can't find a photo of them anywhere.

The term for the pictures you tilt is "lenticular" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lenticular_printing

I saw a jesus one that turned in to mary in some €2 shop recently and looked up the term, never laid eyes on a tackier item.

smurf492

I remember gettingBlack Cauldron figurines in Corn Flakes around 1985 r so

Aglomerado

darkdubh wrote: »

And the airliner models that came with Kellogs Cornflakes.I collected most of these apart from maybe the Lockheed which proved elusive.

http://cerealoffers.com/Kelloggs/Cornflakes/1980s/Airliner_Model_Kit/airliner_model_kit.html

We had loads of those. One of our aunts worked in a hotel so used to get us stuff from the cornflakes packs. I remember these models in particular!

Ralf and Florian

smurf492 wrote: »

I remember gettingBlack Cauldron figurines in Corn Flakes around 1985 r so

I remember those too,had most of them,probably ended up being chewed by the dog.

Ralf and Florian

Anyone remember those glow in the dark stickers of werewolves and vampires,was it Weetabix they came in?They were quite scary,the vampire one I think had all blood on his fangs,and he wasn't a human looking vampire either,some weird monster kind of thing.

BeardySi

darkdubh wrote: »

And the airliner models that came with Kellogs Cornflakes.I collected most of these apart from maybe the Lockheed which proved elusive.

http://cerealoffers.com/Kelloggs/Cornflakes/1980s/Airliner_Model_Kit/airliner_model_kit.html

:eek: I had totally forgotten about those...

The only one I can actually remember having was the Tristar, but then I was 5! must dig out the old Lego box, am sure there'll be one or two at the bottom somewhere!

darkdubh

Ralf and Florian wrote: »

Anyone remember those glow in the dark stickers of werewolves and vampires,was it Weetabix they came in?They were quite scary,the vampire one I think had all blood on his fangs,and he wasn't a human looking vampire either,some weird monster kind of thing.

Weetabix,collected all of these apart from the one in the middle top row(don't know what its supposed to be).The artwork on them was great.

http://kylesarcade.tumblr.com/post/80774266731/weetabix-scary-stickers-1986-these-came-free-in

darkdubh

Another Weetabix promo I remember was the ones they did for the Star Trek movie circa:1979,I must have been 5 or 6 but I clearly remember my older brother collecting them.Pretty sure he'd all of the ones below.



Also there were cardboard cutouts on the back of Weetabix packets of the Starship Enterprise and other ships.Not sure if they were on the same packets as the cards or if they were a later thing,maybe when Wrath Of Khan came out.

darkdubh

Butters1979 wrote: »

They were fantastic. Can't find a photo of them anywhere.

Yeah for some reason theyre really hard to find.Theres a couple of Ebay links with them the first one has the full set.

http://www.ebay.ie/sch/sis.html?_nkw=CIGARETTE%20TRADE%20CARDS%20Kellogg%20PREHISTORIC%20MONSTERS%203%20D&_itemId=110158552170

This one has the hippo and if you look closely you can kind of make out the effect where its changing to a Brontosauros.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/KELLOGGS-PREHISTORIC-MONSTERS-AND-THE-PRESENT-HIPPO-CARD-NO-2-E13-/252065374497

whisky_galore

Butters1979 wrote: »

They were fantastic. Can't find a photo of them anywhere.

Managed to get the whole lot of them, iirc the T.rex/Lion one was a real pain to find.

Frosties did a sort of a water-filled game that looked a bit like a Gameboy. And Corn Flakes had these for 20p...



Rice Krispies had a van similar to the Kellogg's one for their 60th anniversary I think it was, and for something like £2 you could get a 1920's London Bus.

When the Corn Flakes vans came out, the demand was so much, Kellogg's sent a postcard apologising for the delay in sending them out.

Rice Krispies did an alarm clock as well, think it's still knocking about at home.

smurf492

darkdubh wrote: »

Yeah for some reason theyre really hard to find.Theres a couple of Ebay links with them the first one has the full set.


This one has the hippo and if you look closely you can kind of make out the effect where its changing to a Brontosauros.



Thanks for the transport back in time forgot these!!!

darkdubh

I remember sending away for a model of the Kinsale gas rig,it was either Rice Crispies or Kellogs Cornflakes circa mid 80s.It was blue plastic and came in segments that you fitted together much the same as the model airplanes with Cornflakes except it was a good bit bigger.

uch

I was the most popular man in my street in early 1990's, I was a binman and had an endless supply of tokens for all the Cereal toys, Captain Scarlett Die-cast Cars and the like, feckin queue's of kids looking for a handfull

DanielODonnell

In late 1990's there was pencil toppers shaped as premier league football shirts

Graceless

Puppy in my pocket with Weetos cereal in 1994. I was obsessed with these!

Realt Dearg Sec

What a great thread. I remember getting a good few of those water games alright. Frosties also did ball bearing games that were really good. I also have a memory of getting various little two player board games from them, all kind of like Chinese checkers or something.

In latter years when the movie space jam came out you could collect plastic trophies with pictures of all the characters on them. Think I collected most of them, never even occurred to me to watch the film. Coco pops if I'm not mistaken.

Vinculus

I remembered one the other day.
When Jaws 3D was released, Shredded Wheat had 3D cartoon strips based on the movie printed on the box and a pair of 3D glasses in the pack.
They were so much better than the actual movie.

darkdubh

More memories stirring in the back of my head,Kellogs cereal bowels that you sent off tokens for.I'm sure we had the Corn Flakes one.

RupertsHabit

haha, had one of them bowls.

i also vaguely remember some kind of soda-powder powered toys.

you supposedly put soda-powder in them and then put them in water and they were meant to move. dont remember much success though.



.... a bit like the 'ghost in a can' from mcdonalds. still disappointed.

Ice Storm

We had ALL those kellogs bowls! We still had one or two of them until quite recently actually.. extremely faded, mind!

Alienigenis

Damn this thread has me feeling old. I remember getting books, bowls, all sorts of cheaply made but entertaining toys and trinkets. Then the noughties came and cereals started giving out CD ROMs and audio books (Horrible Histories, anyone?) But now we get… feck all!

martinbe

Me and my sister collected all that stuff in the 80s and probably early 90s. We would mainly eat cornflakes but if another company was giving away something better we would switch. My mother was a saint. She would always send away tokens for the Corn Flakes bowels and wheetabix tapes. I remember sending away for cinema tickets for the Black Cauldron. I was recently looking at old photos and seen my cousin with a rice krispies watch on. That would of been the summer of 1990, The reason i know that he also had an Italia 90 T-shirt on.

I stopped eating breakfast 20 years ago. Once i started working breakfast went out the window. I must have a look at the breakfast isle in Tescos next time. Its sad if none of them give toys out anymore.

Realt Dearg Sec

martinbe wrote: »

Me and my sister collected all that stuff in the 80s and probably early 90s. We would mainly eat cornflakes but if another company was giving away something better we would switch. My mother was a saint. She would always send away tokens for the Corn Flakes bowels and wheetabix tapes. I remember sending away for cinema tickets for the Black Cauldron. I was recently looking at old photos and seen my cousin with a rice krispies watch on. That would of been the summer of 1990, The reason i know that he also had an Italia 90 T-shirt on.

I stopped eating breakfast 20 years ago. Once i started working breakfast went out the window. I must have a look at the breakfast isle in Tescos next time. Its sad if none of them give toys out anymore.

They don't, sorry.

Regarding the watch, was it by any chance one that had a kind of plastic bust of snap crackle or pop, that flipped up to reveal the actual time? Or am I imagining those?

martinbe

Thats the one i had one myself. You would press a button and the time would flip up.

L1011

I've suddenly got memories of getting loads of cinema ticket vouchers for MGM cinemas from one of the cereal companies - with the box having a "Dublin*" listing for a yet to be opened one

When it did open, the firm had been bought by Virgin (its the now Cineworld on Parnell Street, two renames on) and they didn't take the vouchers

Del.Monte

Not exactly freebies - the pictures below came as part of the Kellogg's cereal boxes. I still have these ones that were cut out for me 50 or so years ago. They are partially responsible for much of my adult life.

milli milli

orthsquel wrote: »

We had this too! Think we sent away for it. I'm not sure if we made anything from it but I used to love looking at the pictures.

Thanks for all the memories in this thread! Also that EBay link is great for taking a trip down memory lane!

I remember the Black Cauldron and getting hours of entertainment out of the little scenes on the box. I can't believe the EBay link has all the boxes - amazing! I never even seen the film but that box sticks in my mind out of all the Kellogg's freebies.

In the early 80s there was 3 of us kids, and Rice Krispies (we used to call them 'Krispies') would have 3 Freebies for each of the characters - Snap, Crackle & Pop. I was always Crackle! So I would always get the Crackle freebie! Crackle was dressed in green and had blond curly hair. My brothers would each be Snap & Pop!
(It was the same with horses - If we'd ever see them in a field - a brown horse was mine, White was my younger brother and black my older brother! I think the older brother had the privilege of picking first, hence the black colour!)

Anyway I remember getting a Crackle Joke Book. Half the jokes went over my head, cos I was quite young.

I still remember one of the jokes - Secretary 1 - "Do you file your nails?"
Secretary 2 - "No, I just throw them away!"


Also remember all the Tony Tiger freebies - the secret Fan club and magazines - looking back now there were very boyish toys but I suppose I was a tomboy so it didn't bother me too much. Maybe that's why I liked the Black Cauldron because the little character I got was a girl?

What Mum would do was collect all the tokens from the packets and put them in the 'messy drawer'. Then many, many weeks later we'd all help with sorting out the tokens. As a load of things were sent off together we'd get all the freebies in the mail at once! It was great!

I remember seeing 'mouse' shaped markers free with Frosties but we didn't have enough tokens. I was always disappointed we never got them, as I was a big fan of stationery.
Does anybody remember the markers I'm talking about?

Regarding the records from mid 80s - I still have them and went to have a look for them, the last time I was in my parents house. Couldn't find them, but I know they're there. I'm just going to list the songs I know are on them (now these might be mixed up with tapes that came with Weetabix - I think it was- so forgive me)
Wham - Club Tropicana
Bucks Fizz - If you can't stand the heat
Paul Young - Love of the Common People
Bananarama - Robert DeNiro's Waiting
I think Culture Club & the Thompson Twins were also on it.

martinbe

I finally spent a bit of time down the breakfast Isle at Tesco at the weekend. The only companies that are giving something away are Kellogg’s and Weetabix. Kellogg’s are giving away free tickets to theme parks and Weetabix are giving away personalised spoons. Gone are the days of free holograms or bike reflectors . But Park Tickets and spoons is better than nothing I guess.

the groutch

Damn I feel so old reading this thread.

fryup

i suppose they don't do them anymore because they're seen as a choke hazard??