Say the bells of St. Clement's

Clearly, Yellow and Orange are the most hated of all the Starburst flavors.

Note: I'm refusing to refer to them as "Lemon and Orange," because they're pretty far removed from any genuine fruit heritage. I wish Orange didn't have it's little "my color is my name" thing, so I could properly denigrate its candy stand-in.

How did "Orange" even manage that deal? The color and fruit have the same name in almost every language. If there's a Discworldian god of oranges, I'll bet he's got a lot of political savvy.

I may be getting off topic.

The candy jar dynamics of Starburst seem to be pretty consistent in this country. Red-gone. Pink-gone*. Orange and Yellow, still around!

In France, though, it's the red and orange that go first, and they see our love for pink Starburst as a mark of unrefined taste (this is probably something I made up).

Why do they make orange and yellow at all? Since they're so frequently passed over, shouldn't the whole package be made up of red and pink? Is there some powerful citrus lobby I'm not aware of?

Perhaps, like the peanuts of the "mixed nut" industry, orange and yellow are simply cheaper to produce, and thus get used as filler. Or maybe those flavors are designed to be palate cleanser, enhancing the red and pink flavors as you make you way through a package.

Or maybe it's a weird sociological thing, where no one would buy a product with only two flavors, because that wouldn't be enough variety. People want choices, even if a good half of those choices are crappy.

*I love how pink is everyone's favorite, but no one can tell you what the hell flavor that's supposed to be. According to the people at Starburst, that's supposed to be strawberry . . . I find that somehow terrifying.